0"\' 



tp '\^ 








0^ 




^ 9^ 



%,# 









z 












' .<j5 Q 









i:^ ^ 







-' 4 <I ^ 















. s A 






^^ ^% 







<^ ^ ^ - 



<* 
J 
z 







^^(^ 



Ho^ 









^>'^. 



.^" ^ 










\> ^ ^ * « /■ ^ V ^ ^ ■* /■ ^ 















0^ 



^ ^ 



''^^o^ 



*^°<^ 



\>^^*o^^ v^^*«^^ V^^^o^^ 

o ^cP ^V^ JVA^^ /V77 <= tP^ ^V 









a5 Q 



.^^ 



C^" ^ °. 












^^^«- 



\> ^ ^ * ^ 







9>,^'o. k'' \^ 



/ ,- ^ * / 



V^ A^ 



.^ 



V 






^. 



EZEKIEL • CHEEVER 

HVIVS • SCHOLAE • PRAECEPTOR 

PER • ANNOS • PROPE * OCTO • ET • TRIGJNTA 

LONDlNll-NATVS-A.D. MDCXIV- Vllf-KAL. FEB. 

IBI • EDVCATVS * IN • SCHOLA • CHRISTS • HOSPITAL- DfCTA 

!N • NVMERVM • OVIVM • ACADEMICORVM • COLLEGII 

EMMANVEL -IN -VNIVERSITATE-CANTABRIGIENSI 

ASCITVS-A.D. MDCXXXII-PRIDIE-fD. IAN. 

HANG-PETIIT-TERRAM'A.D. MDCXXXVII 

PR AEPOSITVS • HVIC * SCHOLAE • A.D. MDCLXX • VHI • ID. IAN. 

OBIIT • A.D. MDCCVm -Xfl • KAL. SEPT. 

VlXiT • PIE • ANNiS • LXXXXIV 

COTTON • MATHER • DISCIPVLVS • GRATVS • HVIC 
^ OMNEM • NOVAE • ANGLIAE- ERVDITIONEM • ASCRIPSIT - 



TABLET IN THE BOSTON LATIN SCHOOL 



^^chicl (Lhccvcv 
Scboolm aeter 



INTRODUCTION BY 
EDWARD EVERETT HALE, D.D. 



The PALMER 
COMPANY 

50 Bromfield 
St., Boston 




Bie Elisabeth poxtcx (5oulb 

Author of "John Adams and Daniel Webster as Schoolmasters;" 
"The Brownings and America;" "Anne Gilchrist and Walt Whit- 
man; " «• A Pioneer Doctor; " •' One's Self I Sing and Other Poems." 






^^ 



.u^ 



[UBHAKYcf OONGKtiSS 
Two Copies ficceived 

NOV 8 19U4 

Copyrigiit entry 

uLASS CL XXc. Nos 
\ COPY 6 



— ' — ' — -If 



Copyright 1904 

BY 

The Palmer Company 



First Edition 




Ifntrobuction 

WAS greatly pleased when I learned that 
Miss Gould had consented to write the 
life of Ezekiel Cheever, for I knew how 
careful had been her study of the career 
of this interesting man. She knew more 
of him than anyone did ; and now that I have read this 
valuable book, I need hardly say that I am delighted 
with her success. 

I thought I knew something of Cheever myself. In 
one of the Prize Books ^ Mr. Benjamin A. Gould, the 
bead master of the Latin School after 1816, had given 
a little sketch of Cheever' s career; and as schoolboys 
in that old school we knew of his Accidence,^ and that 
he was one of the heroes of the school. I graduated at 
that school in 1835. The exhibition exercises of our 
class marked the second centennial anniversary of the 
school. In 1840 the Latin School Association was 
formed, of which I have now the honor to be Presi- 
dent. I was the first Secretary of that Society and I 
edited its first catalogue. It thus became my pleasant 
duty to find what I then could of Cheever' s life, and I 
like to acknowledge here the help which I received 
from that distinguished historian, Mr. Samuel Francis 
Haven, the accomplished Librarian of the American 
Antiquarian Society. 

I say all this because it is with peculiar satisfaction, 
I may even say surprise, that in reading Miss Gould's 
book I see that she has found clues which we had not 



f1 



lntro&uctton 



suspected, and has so followed them back that she pre- 
sents Cheever to us in our generation as a character 
much more real than he was even to the Latin School 
boys of fifty years ago. The history of New England 
is much better known than it was sixty years ago ; and 
whoever traces the annals, which are so interesting, of 
the steps which made out of a trading corporation an 
independent state in one hundred and fifty years, has to 
consider among the initial agencies of that advance the 
education freely given by the State. Miss Gould has 
done me the honor to print at length in her Appendix 
a paper of mine prepared for Education, I have said 
in that paper that I do not believe that any other trading 
village in the world in the eighteenth century gave to 
one third of its boys and young men such instruction 
in the Latin language as Boston did. Whether trade 
carried them to Cadiz, to Lisbon, to Havana, to Brest, 
or anywhere else in the world, they could speak in 
the Latin language to the foreigner. No man can fol- 
low the history of the American Revolution without 
accounting for the make-up of such men as Sam Adams, 
James Bowdoin, Henry Knox, Joseph Warren, John 
Hancock. Four of these were pupils of the Boston 
Latin School, and Warren would not have been Warren 
but for its avail as a metropolitan school. 

When one says this, he ought to know what made 
a school like that. Mr. Emerson left to us no wiser 
phrase than when he said, " It does not matter so much 
what you study as with whom you study." Who gave 
the Boston Latin School its repute ? Who set the stand- 



Ifntro&uctlon 



ard for the little village, which, at the common charge, 
gave every boy the best training of w^hich that time had 
any idea ? 

Simply it was Ezekiel Cheever, in the years be- 
tween 1639 and 1708. 

A first-rate life of such a man makes a very important 
addition to the history of New England. 



Edward E. Hale. 



lB^c\\ic\ Cbeever 
Scboolmaster 




Bsekfel Cbeever 

>HEN Agassiz requested to go down the 
ages with no other name than ** Teacher,*' 
he not only appropriately crowned his 
own life work, but stamped the vocation 
of teaching with lasting honor. In this vocation, Eze- 
kiel Cheever stands out especially clear. Born in 
London January 25, 1614, in 1637, at the age of twenty- 
three, he came to Boston, seven years after its settle- 
ment. He did not remain there long, however, for the 
following year he is in the Indian region of Quinnipiack 
helping John Davenport, Theophilus Eaton and others 
found what was afterwards called the New Haven Col- 
ony. He was one of the famous little band who in 1639 
in Mr. Newman's barn signed the compact for the 
religious and civil government of the colony ; a '* Fourth 
Colony of New English Christians," which, as 
Cotton Mather says in his Magnalia^ was '* under the 
Conduct of as Holy and as Prudent and as Genteel 
Persons as most that ever visited these Nooks of 
America." Referring to Mr. Eaton, who was chosen 
the first governor, he declares it was **the Admiration 
of all Spectators to behold the Discretion, the Gravity, 
the Equity," with which for about a score of years 
until his death he, as the *' Glory and Pillar" of the 
colony, managed its public affairs. Doubtless the 



lo fisefiiel Cbeever 

young Cheever heard him say what Mather says was a 
favorite aphorism of his, *' Some count it a great 
matter to Die well, but I am sure 'tis a great matter to 
Live well.*' 

While Governor Eaton as the "Moses of the 
Christian Colony'* was particularly engaged in civil 
affairs, John Davenport, as "the Aaron," was leading 
in church affairs, — his ministry, his discipline, his 
government and his universal direction continuing, as 
Mather says, for many years, even till after the resto- 
ration of Charles II., when the Connecticut and New 
Haven Colonies became one. He was a close student, 
so much so that the Indian savages called him, " So 
big study man." A graduate of Oxford University, he 
naturally desired to have a classical school for the 
youth of the new colony. Governor Eaton, who was a 
companion of his in their English life, sympathized 
with his idea. Who could better manage such than 
the young Ezekiel Cheever, who had been educated at 
an English university. He had married and settled 
down among them in a home of his own. Having been 
a student at Emmanuel College, " that Seminary of Pu- 
ritans in Cambridge," as Cotton Mather called it, pos- 
sibly he was better fitted for the work than if educated 
at other colleges. But whether so or not, in the same 
summer as the signing of the compact (1639) a school 
for boys, for " boys only as were to be taught to make 
Latin," was opened in New Haven in his own home, 
said to have been at the corner of Grove and Church 
Streets. Little Michael Wigglesworth, afterwards 



Scboolmaater n 

famous as the author of the Day of Doom^ was one of 
the pupils, his father being one of the townspeople. In 
his Autobiography he tells of being sent to school to 
Mr. Ezekiel Cheever, who " taught school in his own 
house/' and of profiting so much in a year or two, 
** through ye blessing of God," that he began "to 
make Latin and to get forward apace." The records 
of the colony tell that this school was for the *' better 
training up of youth in the town, that through God's 
blessing they may be fitted for public service hereafter 
either in church or commonwealth." 

For several years Mr. Cheever received for his teach- 
ing twenty pounds a year, when, that " not proving a 
competent maintenance," it was increased to thirty 
pounds. A schoolhouse came later into being, said to 
have been built on the Green near Elm Street, a little 
west of Temple. (Blake.) Votes of both town and 
colony are on record for the grade of the school to be 
raised, and for Mr. Cheever' s salary to be increased 
from the public treasury. 

The young teacher was not blessed with riches. 
In 1643 his name is sixth in the list of planters and 
their estates, his estate being valued only at twenty 
pounds. Dr. Leonard Woolsey Bacon, in his ** Histori- 
cal Discourse of New Haven in i860," declared that he 
was the '* most picturesque character " in the history of 
the New Haven Colony. Though he came from an 
accomplished education in London, a contemporary of 
Milton and other classically educated young men, he 
did not, he said, ** hesitate to apply himself to the small 



12 lejeRiel Cbeever 

things of colony life." He noted the repeated indica- 
tions of the esteem in which he was held, *' not only for 
his work's sake, but for his own. His pupils did not 
caricature" him on the blank pages of his Accidence^ 
and call him * Old Cheever * below their breath, as 
long as they went to school to him." 

While he was teaching the New Haven school, Mr. 
Cheever was an efficient helper in other directions, be- 
ing one of the twelve men chosen as " fitt for the foun- 
dacon worke of the church." He was a member of the 
court for the plantation at its first session, and in 1646 
was one of the deputies to the General Court. This 
was an important position, since, there being no written 
code of laws until later, the court then determined all 
differences. As an educator, the young master was 
doubtless interested in the order of the General Court of 
the Massachusetts Colony in 1647 that there should be a 
school for every township of fifty householders, and a 
grammar school for every hundred. He must have 
been conversant with the career of Roger Williams. 
Massasoit, then in his old age, may even have told him of 
the visit of the banished minister to his Rhode Island 
home. Would we could know what he thought of 
Harry Vane, of Anne Hutchinson and her independent 
action ! But all is silence. 

Although never ordained to the ministry, Mr. Cheever 
occasionally preached. His Christian spirit is seen 
when, being brought up before the church for dissenting 
from its judgment concerning some cases of discipline, 
he said, *'I had rather suffer anything from men than 



Scboolmaater 13 

make a shipwreck of a good conscience, or go against 
my present light, though erroneous when discovered." 
But while not wholly freeing himself from blame as to 
his *' want of wisdom and coolness in ordering and utter- 
ing his speeches," yet he could not be convinced that 
he deserved the censure which the church had inflicted 
upon him ; and he could not look upon it as *' dispensed 
according to the rules of Christ." But he concluded 
by saying that he could '' wait upon God for the discov- 
ery of Truth in his own time, either to myself or church ; 
that what is amiss may be repented of and reformed ; 
that His blessing and presence may be among them, and 
upon His holy ordinances rightly dispensed, to His glory 
and their present and everlasting comfort, which I 
heartily pray for." 

At this time (1649) he was afflicted by the death of 
Mary, his wife. Six children — Samuel, Mary, Ezekiel, 
Elizabeth, Sarah and Hannah — had been born to them, 
Ezekiel dying in infancy. 

A cherished hope of the founders of the New 
Haven Colony was to found a college **for the good 
of posterity." For this, even land was set apart 
in the formation of the town ; but circumstances 
did not favor the desire. Disappointment, however, 
only turned the attention of the people to Harvard Col- 
lege, then struggling into life under President Dunster ; 
and there a good number of the New Haven Colony 
boys were sent to be educated. It speaks well for the 
educational influences at work in that vicinity that of 
the Harvard graduates, from its beginning to 1700, as 



14 jeseftiel Cbeever 

many as one in thirty came from New Haven.* 
It is supposed that during his residence in New- 
Haven Ezekiel Cheever wrote his Accidence^ a short 
introduction to the Latin tongue for the use of schools. 
Thi§ little book of less than one hundred pages was 
called the ** wonder of the age," and js said to have 
been used as generally as any elementary work ever 
known; indeed, it is thought to have done more "to 
inspire young minds with the love of the study of the 
Latin language than any other work of the kind since 
the first settlement of the country.'* It passed through 
eighteen editions before the Revolution, the last being 
published in Boston in 1838. f 

In a prospectus, containing commendations of the 
work from many eminent men of learning, the Hon. 
Josiah Quincy, LL.D., President of Harvard Col- 
lege, said of it : ** A work which was used for more 
than a century in the schools of New England as the 
first elementary book for learners of the Latin language ; 
which held its place in some of the most eminent of 
those schools, nearly, if not quite, to the end of the last 
century ; which passed through at least twenty editions 
in this country ; which was the subject of the successive 
labor and improvement of a man who spent seventy 
years in the business of instruction, and whose fame is 
second to that of no schoolmaster New England has ever 



* For some interesting details of this early colonial life, see 
Stories of Old New Haven, by Ernest H. Baldwin. 

t Harvard College has several editions, the earliest being the 
tenth, printed by Edes «& Gill in Queen Street, in 1767. 



Scboolmaater 15 

produced, — requires no additional testimony to its worth 
or its merits. It is distinguished for simplicity, compre- 
hension and exactness." Mr. Quincy knew of what he 
spoke, for from six to fourteen years of age he studied 
the Accidence at the Phillips Academy at Andover, 
Mass., where, he tells us, he was obliged with the rest 
of his classmates, *'to get by heart passages of a book 
which he could not, from his years, possibly understand." 
But by means of this Accidence^ or in spite of it, as his 
son Edmund says in his biography of him, he laid a 
foundation of Latin knowledge which was a help and 
delight to him to the end of life ; indeed, it became his 
amusement in old age. 

Other testimonies of its value have come down to us. 
Samuel Walker, having had it in constant use for his 
pupils for more than fifty years whenever it could be 
obtained, found it to be the *' best book for beginners in 
the study of Latin " that had come to his knowledge, 
''no work of its kind containing so much useful matter 
in so small a compass." Another testimony (Rev. T. 
M. Harris) declared there was "no elementary work 
so well calculated for the beginners as Cheever's 
Accidence — pre-eminently perspicuous, concise and 
comprehensive." 

That Ezekiel Cheever also wrote on religious subjects 
is seen in a little book containing three short essays, 
under the title. Scripture Prophecies Explained, 
The first one is *' On the Restitution of all Things," the 
second "On St. John's First Resurrection," and the third 
*' On the Personal Coming of Jesus Christ, as Com- 



i6 fijeftiel Cbeever 

mencing at the Beginning of the Millennium described in 
the Apocalypse." Although the book did not attain to 
so many editions as the Accidence^ it continued to be 
issued after the death of Mr. Cheever; as late as 1757 
an edition being printed by Green & Russell at their 
printing office in Qiieen Street. (Found in the Boston 
Athenaeum.) 

There are also in existence two manuscript books 
which the schoolmaster owned : one of about four hun- 
dred pages of Latin dissertations, with an occasional 
mathematical figure drawn, — now in possession of the 
Massachusetts Historical Society, — and one kept in the 
safe of the Boston Athenaeum. One handles reverently 
this little brown, leather-covered book of about one 
hundred and twenty pages, on the first of which is the 
year '' 1631," and on the second, in his own handwrit- 
ing, **Ezekiel Cheeuer, his booke." In it are nearly 
fifty pages of Latin poems, besides two in Greek, copied 
before the life in America began ; also a few shorthand 
notes which have been deciphered as Scripture texts. 
Printed in full for the first time, they formed an appen- 
dix to one of Mr. John T. Hassam's valuable papers in 
the New England Historical and Genealogical Reg- 
ister (April, 1879). On the last page of this quaint 
little treasure are written in English some verses, one of 
which can be clearly read as, '* Oh, first seek the kingdom 
of God and his Righteousness, and all things else shall 
be added unto you."* 

* For further details see "The Cheever MSS." in the New 
England Historical and Genealogical Register for January, 
1903. 



Scboolma0ter 17 

After Mr. Cheever had taught in New Haven for 
about twelve years, he left in 1650 to become master of 
the grammar, or free, school in Ipswich, Mass. If 
one can judge by salary received, the schoolmaster 
was appreciated in New Haven, for the town was not 
willing to pay his successor as " large a salary as it had 
done to Mr. Cheever.'* The successor received only 
ten pounds a year. 

Ipswich (or Agawam) was then a town of less than 
twenty years' experience. Within ten years of its settle- 
ment its *' renowned church," Mather tells us, consisted 
mostly of " such illuminated Christians that their pastor 
in the exercise of their ministry had not so much disci- 
ples as judges." By petition of Zaccheus Gould and 
others, that part of the village some seven miles to the 
westward called '*New Meadows" had that year 
become incorporated as a town under the name of 
Topsfield. Salem was not far away. Wenham and 
Manchester were neighboring townships striving to 
grow. In the Wenham church, founded six years 
before, the Rev. John Fisk was doing faithful work, 
content, as Cotton Mather says in his Magnalia^ '* with a 
very mean salary, and consuming his own fair estate for 
the welfare of the new plantation." Governor Endicott 
owned land on the south side of the pretty river which 
still winds its course through the village. Samuel 
Appleton was a large landowner. Thomas Dudley, 
Simon Bradstreet, Richard Saltonstall, and others, 
whose descendants are well known to-day, were identi- 
fied with the town. Governor Winthrop had not been 



i8 fisektel Cbeever 

long dead, while his son John, the founder of the town, 
had special interest for the schoolmaster for his more or 
less connection with the Connecticut and New Haven 
life. 

The free school to which Mr. Cheever came was not 
a public school as we mean it today. A forerunner of 
the academy, it was one endowed with grants of land 
and bequests, in which Latin and Greek were taught, 
supported in part by the parents' fees. We are told 
that the schooling of Simon Bradstreet, when placed at 
the **free school" in Ipswich by his father after his 
removal to Andover, was *' more chargeable." 

In 1653, while Mr. Cheever taught in Ipswich, a phi- 
lanthropic citizen, Robert Payne, gave to the town, in 
addition to a schoolhouse, a dwelling house with two 
acres of land for the use of the schoolmaster. This was 
in line with the accepted idea that a house as well as a 
school building should be provided for the teacher. 

The school so prospered that neighboring towns sent 
pupils to it. Nathaniel Saltonstall was there prepared 
for Harvard, then under the presidency of Charles 
Chauncy. In the class of 1659, Master Cheever must 
have been especially interested, for it contained the name 
of his son Samuel — Samuel Cheverus. This firstborn 
son seemed to be a favorite of his father. It was to him 
he wrote the epistles in Latin — now in the Massachu- 
setts Historical Society — which the Rev. William Bent- 
ley, D.D., of Salem, Mass., said ** were worthy of the 
age of Erasmus and of the days of Ascham." We are 
indebted to a descendant of this firstborn, Mr. John T. 



Scboolmaeter 19 

Hassam, for giving to the public for the first time in full 
a facsimile of one of these Latin letters. Its history is 
interesting. In 1879, failing to find what he wanted, Mr. 
Hassam printed in one of his valuable articles on the 
old schoolmaster a fragment of a letter in the hope it 
might lead to the recovery of the whole. Some twelve 
years later, at a sale of autograph letters and historical 
documents collected by Prof. E. H. Leffingwell, of New 
Haven, Conn., the city of Boston purchased some, among 
them being the original letter in a good state of preser- 
vation. (Appendix I.) Although the year is not on it, 
Mr. Hassam thought that since it was dated November 
24th (^post festuTTi)^ it must have been written on 
Thanksgiving day of 1670, since, with a single excep- 
tion during the colonial period, only in that year did 
Thanksgiving come on that day of the month. The let- 
ter, which begins with ** Chare Jiliy^ and ends with " Tui 
studiosissi pater ^ Ez. Cheever," reveals the father 
going to Cambridge to negotiate as to the marriage of 
Samuel with Ruth, daughter of Edmund Angier, and 
granddaughter of the Rev. Dr. William Ames of Hol- 
land University fame, whose portrait is in Memorial 
Hall, Cambridge. (Appendix II.) Not finding the 
father at home, he writes that he communicated with the 
mother ; but she, not being willing to commit herself, 
referred him to her husband and daughter. It was con- 
ceded that the young lady was superior; indeed, was 
hard to win. On the way back to Boston the master 
says he met the father, who also was averse to commit- 
ting himself. He referred all to the daughter. A year 



20 lescfttel Cbeever 

before this, the father had written a letter to the son from 
Charlestown about the young woman, which Mr. Has- 
sam has also printed in full. But it all came out right ; 
for in June, 1671, the summer after the father's visit to 
Cambridge, Samuel, then nearly thirty-two years of age, 
is married to the Cambridge young lady. He was 
then preaching in Marblehead as the first settled minis- 
ter of the town. There, after a ministry of over fifty 
years, he died and was buried. 

During Master Cheever's eleven years of service in 
Ipswich as schoolmaster, Thomas Dudley and John 
Endicott were among the governors of the Massachu- 
setts Colony — then under its first charter — and William 
Bradford and Edward Winslow among those of the Ply- 
mouth Colony. John Eliot had begun his monumental 
work among the Indians ; Louis XIV. was working 
out his career in France ; and Oliver Cromwell was end- 
ing his heroic struggle in England. If only the school- 
master had jotted down his thoughts of the strange power 
of this wonderful man of the people ! or, if he had 
left on record some of the things he must have heard of 
the ** Tenth Muse," Anne Bradstreet, who, though then 
living in Andover, had written most of her poems while 
residing in Ipswich ! As they were published the year 
of his arrival there, possibly he was familiar with them. 
He may have discussed them with her. Who knows .^ 
She may have told him of one of her admirers, the Rev. 
Nathaniel Ward, who a few years before had published 
what was perhaps the most peculiar book of the colo- 
nial era, ' * The Simple Cobbler of Agawam ;' ' for, though 



Scboolmaeter 21 

now gone to England, he had been a neighbor of hers 
while pastor of the Ipswich church. The school- 
master must have known the Rev. Nathaniel Rogers, 
who died while he taught in the town ; also Pastor Nor- 
ton. One wonders if he ever met that " godly man of 
Ipswich" of whom Cotton Mather tells, who, after Mr. 
Norton was settled in Boston, where he went from 
Ipswich, would travel on foot to that town, almost 
thirty miles, " for nothing but the weekly lecture there." 
He declared it was ** worth a great journey to be a par- 
taker in one of Mr. Norton's prayers." 

But if the practical schoolmaster was not so much in- 
terested in the prayers of the Rev. John Norton, he was 
doubtless a reader of his Latin book, which he wrote in 
1645 by order of the New England ministers, to answer 
the question of divines in Zealand concerning the New 
England church government. He may also have read 
The Orthodox Evangelist^ which he dedicated to his Ips- 
wich church, and other of his treatises. (^Magnalia.^ 
Would we had some of the opinions of this learned, re- 
ligious schoolmaster concerning the books of that day ! 
What did he think of the popular Day of Doom^ which 
his little pupil of years before published in his later 
years? Did he enter into the spirit of the Bay Psahn 
Book^ which must have been known and used during 
his Ipswich life ? Did he enjoy the Ames's Almanacks, 
with their literary and amusing quotations? Was he 
conversant with Shakespeare and Cervantes, who had 
been dead only a little over thirty years? Had he ever 
heard of Raphael, Michael Angelo and other great 



22 i£ic\\icl Cbeever 

painters? But if we do not know this, we do know 
that he was interested in the village, for he planted an 
orchard and built a barn on the land he owned ; all of 
which, on his removal from the town, was purchased 
by the Feoffers and added to the grammar school 
property. We know, too, by an ancient petition signed 
by him while teacher there (now owned by the Ipswich 
Historical Society), that he prayed for a withholding of 
an innholder's license from an unworthy innkeeper; 
indeed, it is thought he wrote it. 

We also know that while living in Ipswich he married 
(1652) for his second wife, Ellen Lathrop, sister of 
Captain Thomas Lathrop of Beverly, who, two years 
before, had brought her from England with the promise 
of being a father to her. Of the children born there, — 
Abigail, Ezekiel, Nathaniel and Thomas, — Ezekiel ap- 
pears in the annals of the village parish of Salem as late 
as 1731 ; while Thomas, after graduating at Harvard in 
1677, became a clergyman in Maiden, Mass., and later 
at Rumney.Marsh (afterwards Chelsea) , where he died 
at the age of ninety-one. His son Ezekiel became an 
honored resident of Charlestown, to whom was granted 
the building of the tomb on old *' Burial Hill" (at the 
end of Phipps Place) , where John Harvard was buried 
the year after Master Cheever came to Boston. Stamped 
with armorial bearings and the inscription "Ezekiel 
Cheever, Esq. His Tomb, 1744,'* it has not only a 
special interest to Cheever descendants, but to all inter- 
ested in colonial affairs. 

Today, a visitor to Ipswich sees on a granite monu- 



ijAsr ur 








IP'SWICH MONUMENT 



Scboolmaeter 23 

ment erected in 1896 on the pretty green where he 
taught and lived, the name of Schoohnaster Cheever 
as one of the ever-to-be-remembered influences in the 
development of the people. It has even been said that 
his labors there were chiefly instrumental in placing 
that town *'in literature and population above all the 
towns of Essex County." (Bentley.) In his address 
upon the unveiling of the memorial (a gift of an 
Appleton),. Rev. T. Frank Waters, President of the 
Ipswich Historical Society, said that "were those 
eleven years in which he wrought the end of that fine 
effort for advanced education in our midst, it would be 
a luminous epoch in our annals. But the school con- 
tinued when he was called to Charlestown. The town 
granted for its support a great farm in Chebacco. 
William Paine made gift of Little Neck^ and the 
revenue from these properties made helpful contribu- 
tions to its support, as it does still to our High School. 
Yonder corner," he declared, "is forever hallowed* by 
the memories of the prayers and toils of that one grea^^ 
teacher." 

After a record of eleven years in Ipswich, Mr. 
Cheever removed to Charlestown (1661) to become 
master of the school there at a salary of thirty pounds a 
year. This salary seems small indeed ; but when we 
read that this faithful teacher was at last obliged to 
petition the selectmen for even this small pay, " since 
the constables were much behind with him," the situa- 
tion becomes pathetic. He asked later that the school- 
house be repaired. In 1669 he is again before the town, 



24 lEsckiel Cbeever 

asking for a "piece of ground or house plott whereon 
to build an house for his familie," which petition he 
left for the townsmen to consider. They voted in favor 
of the request, but as Mr. Cheever was called the fol- 
lowing year to Boston, it is probable that his successor 
had the benefit of it. 

After teaching in Charlestown nine years, Mr. 
Cheever accepted the invitation of Boston town to 
become master of its Latin School. This was in Jan- 
uary, 1 67 1. He was then fifty-seven years old, and had 
taught school over thirty year^i! He had seen the de- 
velopment of his own land, and had doubtless felt the 
pulse of his native England, where Milton, old and 
blind, was still living. Perhaps he had read the Para- 
dise Lost of his English contemporary, since it had 
been published several years. He doubtless knew of 
Dryden, who, two years before, under Charles II., had 
become poet laureate. Alexander Pope was not born. 
Louis XIV. was still ruling France. Richard Belling- 
ham was Governor of the Massachusetts Colony, which, 
before Master Cheever' s long service should end, would 
become one with the Plymouth. 

The Boston school to which Mr. Cheever now came 
had been in existence thirty-five years. It remained for 
a descendant of the old master, the Rev. Henry F. 
Jenks, to give to the public in his *' History of the 
Latin School," an interesting account of the time- 
honored institution. Founded by an agreement among 
the first citizens of Boston led by Governor Win- 
throp, it antedated even Harvard College. Dr. Edward 



Scboolmaater 25 

Everett Hale, as President of the Boston Latin School 
Association, has also told of its history. (Appendix 
III.) A bronze tablet in the rear of King's Chapel 
now marks the spot where the first schoolhouse stood ; 
later it was across the street. The different names of 
this street — School-House Lane, South Latin Grammar 
School, etc. — were in 1708 by vote of the town, merged 
into that of the one it bears to-day — School Street. 
Prominent men of the day lived near. Judge Sewall 
was a familiar figure walking from his home, not far 
away, to the meetinghouse on what is now Washington 
Street. As a personal friend of Master Cheever, he 
visited him in the schoolhouse. In his Diary (dated Sep- 
tember 13, 1686) he says that as he went '' in the morn 
to hear Cotton Mather preach the Election Sermon for 
the Artillery at Charlestown,'* he *'had Sam to the 
Latin school, which is the first time." He declares 
that *' Mr. Cheever received him gladly.'* Together he 
and the master may have gone to hear the son, the Rev. 
Samuel Cheever, preach the Artillery Election Sermon 
(1684) from the text Hebrew ii. 10, "For it became 
him, for whom are all things, and by whom are all 
things, in bringing many sons unto glory, to make the 
Captain of their salvation perfect through sufferings." 
Or they may have gone together to the weekly Thursday 
lecture, for which the school was dismissed at ten 
o'clock; on other days it closed at eleven. With an 
attendamus to a short prayer, it opened at seven in 
the morning during summer and at eight in the winter. 
All the year round it began at one in the afternoon, and, 



26 fiseftlel dbecvet 

with a deponite libros^ closed at five. Here boys learned 
their Latin Accidence^ and went to Harvard, which for 
two generations was the only college in New England. 
In Greek they read mostly the New Testament. Cotton 
Mather says it was noted that when " Scholars came to 
be admitted into the College, they who came from 
Cheeverian Education were generally the most unex- 
ceptionable.*' Sibley tells us that an Ipswich pupil, 
Simon Bradstreet, of Harvard, 1660, was not only noted 
as defending the position, Omnes Artes Accidentur 
Theologice^ but, when he '* went out Master of Arts'' 
in 1663, as defending the thesis, Discremen Boni et 
mail Cognoscitur a lege Naturce. Another pupil, 
John Leverett, of the Boston Latin School, was the 
Latin salutatorian of his class of 1680. We are also 
told {^Historical Register) that when Nehemiah 
Walter, who married a daughter of Increase Mather, 
was taken to the *' famous Mr. Cheever with a view to 
his preparing him for college," Mr. Cheever returned 
him to his father, after a "short examination and ex- 
periment," with a "great encomium, pronouncing him 
already well stocked with classic learning, and abun- 
dantly finished to enter upon academical studies." Such 
results would be natural from the fact which Mather 
tells, that his " Master went thro' this Hard Work with 
so much Delight in it, as a Work for God and Christ 
and his People." 

Besides their book knowledge, the old master had an 
interest in his pupils' personal welfare. Possibly he was 
reminded of his own young days, when, asa " Blue Coat 



Scboolmaeter 27 

Boy'* in London, with the tails of his long blue coat 
tucked up under his leather belt, he had played in the 
open space of the school buildings in Newgate Street in 
the same *' Christ's Hospital" which we know today.* 
Doubtless he told them of his annual Easter march with 
the boys to the Mansion House, where the Lord Mayor 
gave them buns, coins, etc., with elaborate ceremony; 
a march taken by Charles Lamb, Coleridge, Leigh 
Hunt, and so many other little Blue Coat Boys in the 
many years since Edward VI., in 1552, founded the 
school. However this may be, in his service now as 
schoolmaster, this seven years' experience as a Blue 
Coat Boy (1626-1633) must have allied him more 
closely to a schoolmaster in the neighboring town of 
Cambridge, Elijah Corlet, who, Waters tells us, was 
also a Blue Coat Boy.t 

For his service as Latin School master in '* the Metrop- 
olis of the English America" — as the pastor of the 
North Church called Boston — Mr. Cheever received a 
salary of sixty pounds a year. This was more than his 
friend Elijah Corlet received ; for according to the town 
records, only a few years before, Cambridge had voted 
him an annual salary of twenty pounds so long as he 
should continue to be schoolmaster in that place ; and 
there seems to be no evidence that this man of ** learn- 
ing, piety and respectability," of *' abilities, dexterity 
and painfulnesse " in teaching youths for over forty 



* The hospital was removed to Horsham, Sussex, in 1902. 

t For further particulars of the Blue Coat Boys see Annals of 
Ckrtsfs Hospital, hy E. H. Pearce; also Trollope's History of 
Christ's Hospital. 



28 jescftiel Cbecver 

years as master of the grammar school by the side of 
Harvard College, ever received more. But for his 
** extraordinary paines " in teaching the Indians designed 
for Harvard he received compensation from the Society 
for Propagating the Gospel. 

But if Master Cheever had the name of receiving a 
salary of sixty pounds a year in Boston, as in Charles- 
town, he had difficulty in getting it ; for in 1 687-1 688 he 
is sending the following petition to His Excellency Sir 
Edmund Andros, *' Knight, Governor, and Captain 
General of His Majesty's Territories and Dominions in 
New England," for the fifty-five pounds due him, 
'* having been near fifty years employed in the work and 
office of a public Grammar Schoolmaster *' : — 

" The humble peticon of Ezekiel Cheever of Boston, 
Schoolmr. Sheweth that your poor peticoner hath 
now fifty years been employed in ye work and office of 
a publick Grammar-Schoolmr. in several places in this 
Country, with what acceptance & success I submit to 
the judgment of those that are able to testify. Now 
seeing God is pleased, mercifully yet to continue my 
wonted abilities of mind, health of body, vivacity of 
spirit, delight in my work, which alone I am in any way 
fit for, & capable of, & whereby I have my outward sub- 
sistance. I most humbly entreat your Excellency, yet 
according to your former kindness often manifested, I 
may by your Excellencies favor, allowance, & encour- 
agement still be continued in my present place. And 
whereas there is due to me about fifty-five pounds for 
my labours past & ye former way of that part of my 
maintenance usually raised by a rate, is thought good to 
be altered, I with all submission beseech your Excel- 



Scboolmaeter 29 

lency that you would be pleased to give order for my 
due satisfaction, ye want of which would fall heavy 
upon me in my old age, and my children also who are 
otherwise poor enough. 

'* And your poor peticoner shall ever pray. 

*' I am Excellencies most humble servt. 

EZEKIEL ChEEVER.** 

It is thought that Mr. Cheever lived in the school 
building, since besides his salary he was to have 
*' possession and use of ye schoole-house.'* But after a 
while the selectmen were making arrangements for a 
house to be built for him, in accordance with the vote 
of the town (March, 1701) that a " House be built for 
Old Mr. Eze'k Cheever, the Latin School-Master," and 
that the " Selectmen Take Care about the Building of 
it.'* The following details of the agreement made with 
Captain John Barnet concerning the house as found in 
the old records are suggestive indeed : — 

*' That the said Barnet shall erect a House on the Land 
where Mr. Ezekiel Cheever Lately dwelt, of forty foot 
Long Twenty foot wide and Twenty foot stud with 
four foot Rise in the Roof, to make a cellar floor under 
one half of S** house and to build a Kitchen of Sixteen 
foot in Length and twelve foot in breadth with a 
Chamber therein, and to Lay the floors flush through 
out the maine house and to make three paire of Stayers 
in y® main house and one paire in the Kitchen and to 
Inclose s^ house and to do and complete all carpenters 
worke and to find all timber boards clapboards nayles 
glass and Glaziers worke and Iron worke and to make 
one Cellar door and to finde one Lock for the Outer 
door of said House, and also to make the Casements for 



30 lescftiel Cbeever 

S** house, and perform S* worke and to finish S** build- 
ing by the first day of August next. In consideration 
whereof the Selectmen do agree that the S** Capt. 
Barnet shall have the Old Timber boards Iron worke 
and glass of the Old house now Standing on S*^ Land 
and to pay unto him the Sum of one hundred and thirty 
pounds money, that is to say forty pounds down in 
hand and the rest as the worke goes on.** 

Then follows the agreement for the " masons' worke ** 
in all its details. Later on, in March, 1702, there is 
some discussion as to how far back from the street the 
house should be placed. But in June of that year the 
house is up, for the worthy dignitaries order that " Capt. 
John Barnard do provide a Raysing Dinner for the Rays- 
ing the Schoolmasters House at the Charge of the town not 
exceeding the Sum of Three pounds." This was done, 
for later they order the " noat for three pounds, ex- 
pended by him for a dinner at Raysing the School- 
masters House,*' be paid him. 

After Mr. Cheever's house had received all this pains- 
taking attention, the town voted that a " New School 
House be built instead of the Old School House in 
which Mr. Ezekiel Cheever Teacheth, and it is Left 
with the Selectmen to get the same accomplished.'* 
The particulars of this work are given with as much 
detail in the Selectmen's Minutes of July 24, 1704, as 
those of the House : — 

*' Agreed w*^ M'^ John Barnerd as followeth, he to 
build a new School House of forty foot Long Twenty 
five foot wide and Eleven foot Stud, with eight win- 
dows below and five in the Roofe, with wooden Case- 



ScbooIma0ter 31 

ments to the eight Windows, to Lay the lower floor 
with Sleepers & double boards So far as needful, and 
the Chamber floor with Single boards, to board below 
the plate inside & inside and out, to Clapboard the Outside 
and Shingle the Roof, to make a place to hang the Bell 
in, to make a paire of Stalres up to the Chamber, and 
from thence a Ladder to the bell, to make one door next 
the Street, and a petition Cross the house below, and to 
make three rows of benches for the boyes on each Side 
of the room, to find all Timber, boards, Clapboards 
shingles nayles hinges. In consideration whereof the 
s^ M' John Barnerd is to be paid One hundred pounds, 
and to have the Timber, Boards, and Iron worke of the 
Old School House." 

Would we had :oday the names of the boys, some- 
times over a hundred at a time, who sat on these 
benches, as well as a record of the daily events ! If 
we have not these, we have the schoolmaster and the 
school, as pictured by Hawthorne in his *' Grandfather's 
Chair," where on a winter's day he takes a peep into 
the schoolroom — "a large, dingy room, with a sanded 
floor, lighted by windows that turn on hinges and have 
little diamond-shaped panes of glass." From the large 
fireplace at one end of the room a bright blaze went 
leaping up the chimney from the great logs of wood. 
Every few moments a cloud of smoke is puffed into the 
room, sailing '' slowly over the heads of the scholars 
until it gradually settles upon the walls and ceiling, 
already blackened with the smoke of years." On long 
benches with desks before them sit the pupils before 
the *' venerable schoolmaster, severe in aspect, with a 
black skull cap on his head, like the ancient Puritan, 



fi3cftiel Cbeever 



and the snow of his white beard drifting down to his 
very girdle. ... A rod of birch is hanging over the 
fireplace, and a heavy ferule lies on the master's desk. 
. . . Buz ! buz ! buz ! Amid just such a murmur has 
Master Cheever spent above sixty years ; and long habit 
has made it as pleasant to him as the hum of a bee-hive 
when the insects are busy in the sunshine. . . . Now a 
class in Latin is called to recite. Forth steps a row of 
queer-looking little fellows wearing square-skirted coats 
and small-clothes, with buttons at the knee. They look 
like so many grandfathers in their second childhood. 
These lads are to be sent to Cambridge and educated for 
the learned professions. Old Master Cheever has lived 
so long, and seen so many generations of schoolboys 
grow up to be men, that now he can almost prophesy 
what sort of a man each boy will be. One urchin shall 
hereafter be a doctor, and administer pills and potions, 
and stalk gravely through life, perfumed with assafoetida. 
Another shall wrangle at the bar, and fight his way to 
wealth and honors, and, in his declining age, shall be a 
worshipful member of His Majesty's Council. A third 
— and he the master's favorite — shall be a worthy suc- 
cessor to the old Puritan ministers now in their graves ; 
he shall preach with great unction and effect, and leave 
volumes of sermons in print and manuscript for the 
benefit of future generations. But, as they are merely 
schoolboys now, their business is to construe Virgil. 
Poor Virgil, whose verses, which he took so much pains 
to polish, have been mis-scanned, and mis-parsed, and 
mis-interpreted by so many generations of idle school- 



Scboolmaeter 33 

boys ! There, sit down, ye Latinists. Two or three of 
you I fear are doomed to feel the master's ferule. . . . 
Next comes a class in arithmetic. These boys are to 
be merchants, shop-keepers and mechanics of a future 
period. Hitherto they have traded only in marbles and 
apples. Hereafter some will send vessels to England 
for broadcloths, and all sorts of manufactured wares, 
and to the West Indies for sugar and rum and coffee. 
Others will stand behind counters and measure tape and 
ribbon and cambric by the yard. Others will upheave the 
blacksmith's hammer or take the lapstone and the awl 
and learn the trade of shoemaking. Many will follow the 
sea, and become bold, rough sea-captains. This class 
of boys, in short, must supply the world with those 
active, skilful hands, and clear, sagacious heads without 
which the affairs of life would be thrown into confusion 
by the theories of studious and visionary men. Where- 
fore, teach them their multiplication table, good Master 
Cheever, and whip them well when they deserve it ; for 
much of the country's welfare depends on these boys. 
But, alas ! while we have been thinking of other matters 
Master Cheever' s watchful eye has caught two boys at 
play. Now we shall see awful times. Master Cheever 
has taken down that terrible birch rod ! Short is the 
trial — the sentence quickly passed— and now the judge 
prepares to execute it in person. Thwack ! Thwack ! 
Thwack! In these good old times a schoolmaster's 
blows were well laid on. See ! the birch rod has lost 
several of its twigs. Mercy on us, what a bellowing 
the urchins make! My ears are almost deafened, 



34 lEscftiel Cbeever 

though the clamor comes through the far length of a 
hundred and fifty years. There, go to your seats, poor 
boys ; and do not cry, sweet little Alice, for they have 
ceased to feel the pain a long time since. And thus the 
forenoon passes away. Now it is twelve o'clock. The 
master looks at his great silver watch, and then, with 
tiresome deliberation, puts the ferule into his desk. 
The little multitude await the word of dismissal with 
almost irrepressible impatience. 

*''You are dismissed,' says Master Cheever. The 
boys retire, treading softly until they have passed the 
threshold ; but fairly out of the schoolroom, lo, what a 
joyous shout ! what a scampering and tramping of feet ! 
what a sense of recovered freedom expressed in the 
merry uproar of all their voices ! What care they for 
the ferule and birch rod now? Were boys created 
merely to study Latin and arithmetic? No. Happy 
boys ! Enjoy your playtime now, and come again to 
study and to feel the birch rod and the ferule to-morrow ; 
not till to-morrow; for today is Thursday-lecture, and 
ever since the settlement of Massachusetts there has been 
no school on Thursday afternoons. 

** Now the master has set everything to rights, and is 
ready to go home to dinner. Yet he goes reluctantly. 
The old man has spent so much of his life in the smoky, 
noisy, buzzing schoolroom, that when he has a holiday 
he feels as if his place were lost, and himself a stranger 
in the world. But forth he goes — and then stands our 
old chair vacant and solitary." 

This is the school as seen by the eye of genius. But 



Scboolmaatet 35 

what is even better, there are some reminiscences pre- 
served by old pupils. Cotton Mather, recalling these 
days of his master to his son Samuel in a manuscript 
left him (^Paterna)^ tells how at the age of a little more 
than eleven years he had composed many Latin exer- 
cises, both in prose and verse, and could speak Latin so 
readily that he could write in it notes of sermons of the 
English preacher. He also declares that he had con- 
versed with Cato, Corderius, Terence, Tully, Ovid, and 
Virgil ; had made epistles and themes, presenting his 
first theme to his master without his requiring or expect- 
ing any such thing of him. For this he had been com- 
plimented by the master with, Laudabilis diligentia 
tua (Your diligence is praiseworthy). Besides going 
through a great part of the New Testament in Greek, 
he had read considerable in Socrates and Homer, and 
had made some entrance in Hebrew grammar. And all 
this ** laudable proficiency,*' as his son calls it in his 
biography of him, was made under the "famous Mr. 
Ezekiel Cheever," whom he calls *'a very learned, 
pious man, and an excellent Schoolmaster." Cotton 
Mather still further tells how his loved master prayed 
with them every day, and catechised them every week ; 
how he *'let faL such Holy Counsels" upon them, 
took so many occasions to make speeches unto them 
*'that should make them afraid of sin, and incurring 
the fearful judgments of God by sin," that he felt 
impelled **to propose him for Imitation." Out of 
the school he said he was *' A Christian of the Old 
Fashion ; An Old new English Christian . . . well 



36 jescftiel Cbeever 

Studied in the Body of Divinity ; an able Defender of 
the Faith and Order of the Gospel ; notably Conversant 
and Acquainted vv^ith the Scriptural Prophecies ... as 
Venerable a Sight as the World since the Days of Prim- 
itive Christianity has ever looked upon." 

Another pupil, Rev. John Barnard, of Marblehead, 
in his Autobiography (now in the Massachusetts His- 
torical Society) tells of having been sent as a boy "to 
the Grammar school, under the tuition of the aged, 
venerable, and justly famous, Mr. Ezekiel Cheever.*' 
"Once in making a piece of Latin," he says, "my 
Master found fault with the syntax of one word which 
was not so used by me heedlessly, but designedly, and 
therefore I told him there was a plain grammar rule for 
it." He angrily replied there was no such rule. I took 
the grammar and showed the rule to him. Then he 
smiling said: "Thou art a brave boy. I had forgot 
it." "And no wonder," Mr. Barnard lovingly adds, 
"for he was then above eighty years old." A Latin 
School boy of this latter day (Phillips Brook?) calls this 
incident, after letting the " serious face of the school- 
master pass smiling out of our sight," the " very hero- 
ism of school-teaching." Mr. Barnard also refers to 
the turning of ^^sop' s Fables into Latin verse as one 
of the " exercises Master put our Class upon." 

Not only as a pupil, however, but as a colleague of 
his son Samuel in the Marblehead church did Mr. 
Barnard have special remembrance of the old school- 
master. It was he who preached the funeral sermon of 
Samuel — his predecessor — to whom, years after the 



Scboolmaeter 37 

father had been laid to rest, he refers in his Sketch of 
Eminent Ministers as ** of great classick learning, a 
good preacher, a thorough Christian and a prudent man.'* 
(Appendix IV.) 

In his Literary Diary (April 25, 1772) Ezra Stiles, 
President of Yale College, tells of seeing in the rev- 
erend and aged Mr. Samuel Maxwell, of Warren, R. I., 
a man who had been acquainted with one of the *' origi- 
nal and first settlers of New England, now a rarity," 
who told him that he well knew the famous grammar 
schoolteacher Mr. Ezekiel Cheever, of Boston, author of 
the Accidence; that he wore a long white beard termi- 
nating in a point ; that when he stroked his beard to the 
point, it was a sign for the boys to stand clear. 

With increase of pupils, Mr. Cheever began to hire 
an assistant at his own expense. But in March, 1699, 
at a public meeting of the inhabitants of Boston, it 
was voted that the selectmen arrange for such. Thus 
it happened that not long after, Mr. Ezekiel Lewis, a 
grandson of the old master then eighty-five years old, 
became his assistant, at a salary of forty pounds a year. 
This, however, not proving sufficient, his request later 
(1701) for forty-five pounds a year was granted. Two 
years after this, the town is paying Mr. Nathaniel Wil- 
liams, the assistant who took his place, eighty pounds 
a year. This Boston boy had been a pupil of the school 
and of Harvard. In the funeral oration which the 
pastor of the Old South, Rev. Thomas Prince, de- 
livered at the time of his death years after (1738), he 
declared that in this " laborious and important service " 



38 J63cftiel Cbeever 

as colleague and successor of Master Cheever, "by an 
agreeable mixture of majesty and sweetness, both in his 
Voice and countenance, with a mild and steady conduct, 
he happily ruled and was generally both reverenced and 
beloved." He referred to the Latin School as being 
then *'the only Publick and Free Grammar School of 
the Great Town, the Principal School of the British 
Colonies, if not of all America." 

The last two years of Mr. Cheever' s life were made 
more lonely by the death of his wife. But he had the 
loving care of his youngest daughter, Susannah, who 
had married, in 1693, Mr. Joseph Russell. He had 
also faithful friends. Judge Sewall gave him his 
affection to the end. In his Diary he tells of his 
visiting him when he had entered his eighty-eighth year, 
being the oldest man in town. At another time he 
says: "Master Cheever, his coming to me last Satur- 
day, January 31, on purpose to tell me he blessed 
God that I had stood up for the Truth is more com- 
fort to me than Mr. Borland's unhandsomeness is dis- 
comfort." Again he speaks of him as being a bearer 
several times at funerals, where at one he, with 
others, received a scarf and ring which * * were given 
at the House after coming from the Grave." He 
refers to a peculiarity of the venerable schoolmaster 
when he says : ' ' Mr. Wadsworth appears at Lecture 
in his Perriwig; Mr. Cheever is grieved at it." Mr. 
Cheever, however, was not the only one who was 
opposed to periwigs. The apostle Eliot preached and 
prayed against them. Even Judge Sewall himself 




JUDGE SEWALL 
(As copied from portrait in Massachusetts Historical Society Rooms) 



ScbooIma0ter 39 

had a religious abhorrence of such, being frank and posi- 
tive in his denunciations to friends who wore them. He 
took special pains to copy some reasons he saw against 
*' mens wearing of Perewigs made of Womens hair, as 
the custom now is, deduced from Scripture & Reason." 
In his Journal of 1699 he refers to going to lecture 
wearing his black cap, and we see him today in the 
Massachusetts Historical Society rooms, painted by Smy- 
bert, in a black skullcap crowning his white locks. 
But if in his old age Master Cheever was grieved at 
the use of periwigs, he was doubtless pleased with the 
work of his children ; for his son Samuel, besides being 
one of the ministers consulted concerning the witchcraft 
trials in Salem, was one of those who petitioned the 
General Court in 1 703 in behalf of the witchcraft suffer- 
ers. Had the father lived a few years longer he would 
probably have been an eager listener to the election 
sermon this son preached in the Old South Meeting- 
house, the first one preached in that building. (Ap- 
pendix IV.) 

Then the master must have congratulated his grand- 
son, Ames, the son of Samuel, upon his graduation from 
Harvard in 1707. He certainly would have given him 
his blessing had he lived to see him become the first 
settled minister of Manchester, Mass., where he died 
and was buried. (Appendix V.) 

But the old schoolmaster could not go on teaching for- 
ever. He had taught seventy years when his last illness 
came upon him. In the following touching account in 
his Diary, Judge Sewall says of his friend : — 



40 lescftiel Cbeever 

''^ Aug'^ 12, 1708. — Mr. Chiever is abroad & hears 
Mr. Cotton Mather preach. This is the last of his 
going abroad. Was taken very sick, like to die with a 
Flux. Aug". 13. — I go to see him, went in with his son 
Thomas and Mr. Lewis. His Son spake to him and he 
knew him not ; I spake to him and he bid me speak 
again; then he said, Now I know you, and speaking 
cheerily mentioned my name. I ask'd his Blessing for 
me and my family; He said I was Bless' d, and it could 
not be Reversed. Yet at my going away He pray'd for 
a Blessing for me. 

** Aug. 19. — I visited Mr. Chiever again, just before 
Lecture ; Thank' d him for his kindness to me and mine ; 
desired his prayers for me, my family, Boston, Salem, 
the Province. He rec'd me with abundance of 
Affection, taking me by the hand several times. He 
said. The Afflictions of God's people, God by them did 
as a Goldsmith, knock, knock, knock ; knock, knock, 
knock, to finish the plate ; It was to perfect them not to 
punish them. I went and told Mr. Pemberton (the Pas- 
tor of Old South) who preached. 

" Aug. 20. — I visited Mr. Chiever who was now 
grown much weaker, and his speech very low. He 
call'd Daughter! When his daughter Russel came, He 
ask'd if the family were composed; They apprehended 
He was uneasy because there had not been Prayer that 
morn ; and solicited me to Pray ; I was loth and advised 
them to send for Mr. Williams, as most natural, homo- 
geneous ; They declin'd it, and I went to Prayer. 
After, I told him. The last enemy was Death, and God 
hath made that a friend too ; He put his hand out of the 
Bed, and held it up, to signify his Assent. Observing 
he suck'd a piece of an Orange, put it orderly into his 
mouth and chew'd it, and then took out the core. After 
dinner I carried a few of the best Figs I could get and a 
dish Marmalet. I spake not to him now. 



Scboolmaeter 41 

*'^Aug. 21. — Mr. Edward Oakes tells me Mr. Chiever 
died this last night.' ' 

Then in a note he tells the chief facts in his life, 
which he closes with : — 

<* So that he has Laboured in that calling (teaching) 
skilfully, diligently, constantly, Religiously, Seventy 
years, A rare Instance of Piety, Health, Strength, Ser- 
viceableness. The Wellfare of the Province was much 
upon his spirit. He abominated Perriwiggs." 

Thus the old schoolmaster died in the harness, teach- 
ing up to his last illness, when almost ninety-four years 
of age. 

His funeral was from the schoolhouse, when — ac- 
cording to Judge Sewall — the governor, councilors, 
ministers, justices and gentlemen were present. Mr. 
Nathaniel Williams, his successor as master of the 
school, *' made a handsome Latin oration in his Honor." 
After naming the bearers, the judge adds that he was 
earnestly solicited after the funeral " to speak to a place 
of Scripture, at the private Quarter Meeting in the room 
of Mr. Cheever." It seemed to be a joy to him that 
the old schoolmaster began and ended his '* American 
Race in Boston;" that his "holy, useful life was a 
married life ; he married and then fell to keeping 
school." He evidently was pleased with his earthly 
habitations, for in writing to Increase Mather of the 
town expenses, he refers to the " very good school- 
house and dwelling-house" which had been built for 
him, adding *'Our late excellent master, Mr. Ezekiel 
Cheever, went to his heavenly mansion from a very 
pleasant Earthly Situation." {Lette?- Book,) 



42 je3cftlel Cbeever 

At the time of his death, Joseph Dudley was governor 
of the colony, and Queen Anne ruled in England. 
During his thirty-eight years' service in Boston, the old 
schoolmaster had seen the administrations of Governors 
Bellingham, Leverett, Simon Bradstreet, Sir Edmund 
Andros, and other prominent men. He had been a 
friend of the Boston pastors. But the most stirring 
days of America's struggle had not arrived. Washing- 
ton, John Adams, Jefferson, Paul Revere, John Han- 
cock and other leaders were not born. Franklin had 
been baptized in the Old South Meeting House only 
two years before. But enough had been acted to arouse 
the attention and interest of the successful master. The 
troubles and sorrows of the Indians had been revealed in 
King Philip's War (i 675-1 676.) The fanaticism and 
horror of the Salem witchcraft of 1692 had shocked 
the finest minds, and the career of George Fox and the 
Quakers was claiming attention. 

Governor Hutchinson in his History of Massachusetts 
refers to his departed master as " venerable, not merely 
for his great age, ninety-four, but for having been the 
schoolmaster of most of the principal gentlemen in 
Boston who were then upon the stage." His young 
Harvard Latin salutatorian, John Leverett, was then 
president of the college at a salary of one hundred and 
fifty pounds a year. Another pupil. Cotton Mather, 
who felt sure he had " as much Reason to appear for 
Him as ever Crito for his Master Socrates," preached 
his funeral sermon. Printed in Boston in 1708, and 
later in 1774, its title page called him the '* Ancient and 



Scboolma0ter 43 

Honorable Master of the Free School in Boston, who 
left off but when Mortality took him off in August, 1 708." 

The ** Historical Introduction" to the sermon, in 
giving the main facts of his life, closed by saying that 
**He had been a Skillful, Painful, Faithful School- 
master for Seventy years, and had the singular favour 
of Heaven that tho' he had Usefully spent his Life 
among Children, yet he was not become Twice a child 
but held his Abilities with his Usefulness, in an unusual 
degree to the very last." 

In the sermon proper he testified to the intellectual 
force of his master, which was *' as little abated as his 
natural." He exemplified the fulfillment of that word, 
** As thy days so shall thy strength be." Before clos- 
ing with a Latin epitaph, he gave an essay in rhyme, 
to the memory of his ** Venerable Master," which he 
hoped might ** in any measure animate the Gratitude of 
any Scholars to their Well-deserving Tutors." 

It began as follows : — 

•'You that are Men, and Thoughts of Manhood know, 

Be just now to the Man that made you so. 

Martyred by Scholars, the stabbed Cassian dies. 

And falls to cursed Lads a sacrifice. 

Not so my Cheever, not by scholars slain, 

But Praised and Loved and Wished to Life again. 

A Mighty Tribe of Well-instructed Youth 

Tell what they owe to him, and Tell the Truth ; 

All the Eight parts of Speech he taught to them 

They now Employ to Trumpet his Esteem. 



With interjections they break off at last, 
But Ah, is all they use, Wo, and Alas !" 



44 j£^c\{icl Cbeever 

In over 200 lines the memorial rhyme goes on. 

" Do but name Cheever and the Echo, straight 
Upon that name, Good Latin will Repeat. 

And in our School a Miracle is wrought, 
For the Dead Languages to Life are brought. 

How oft we saw him tread the Milky Way 
Which to the glorious Throne of Mercy lay ! 
Come from the Mount he shone with ancient Grace, 
Awful the splendor of his Aged Face. 

His Work he loved ; Oh had we done the same ! 
Our Play-Dayes still to him ungrateful came ; 
And yet so well our Work adjusted Lay, 
We came to Work as if we came to Play. 

'Tis Corlet's pains & Cheever's we must own. 
That thou, New England, art not Scythia grown. 
You that in t'other Hemisphere do dwell 
Do of Old Age your dismal stories tell. 

To weak Old Age you say there must belong 

A trembling Palsey both of Limb and Tongue. 

Dayes all decrepit ; and a Bending Back, 

Propt by a Staff, in Hands that ever shake. 

Nay, Syrs, our Cheever shall confute you all, 

On Whom there did none of these Mischiefs fall. 

He lived and to vast Age no Illness knew, 

Till Time's Scj'the waiting for him Rusty grew. 

He Lived and Wrought ; His Labours were Immense, 

But ne'er Declined to Praeter perfect Tense. 

Death gently cut the stalk and kindly laid 
Him, where our God his Granary has made." 

(Appendix VI.) 



Scboolmaetet 45 

'*The muse was never more modish and self-con- 
scious/' declared Phillips Brooks in referring to this 
essay in rhyme; "poetry never labored under such 
mountain-weight of pedantry ; conceits never so turned 
and returned and doubled on themselves ; the flowers 
of rhetoric never so ran to seed, as in these marvelous 
verses in which this minister of the North Church did 
obituary honor to the Master of the Latin School." 
*' And yet it shows,'* he concluded, " that the reality of 
his pupil's tribute to his greatness pierced through all 
his absurd exaggerations, and made him walk grandly 
even in these preposterous clothes." 

The delivery of this essay in rhyme evidently brought 
to mind other elegies which had been written in honor 
of the faithful ; for there was published upon the death 
of Master Cheever one which his immediate predecessor 
as master of the school, Benjamin Tompson* had writ- 



* Benjamin Tompson, schoolmaster, physician and poet, the 
son of Rev. William Tompson of Braintree, was born July 14, 
1642 ; graduated at Harvard College, 1662. In the Eustis Street 
burying-ground in Roxbury, where he lies buried, is the follow- 
ing inscription to his memory: — 

SUB SPE IMMORTALI YE 
HERSE OF M^ BENJ THOMPSON y* 
LEARNED SCHOOLMASTER 
e 
& PHYSICIAN & Y 
RENOUNED POET OF N : ENGL : 
OBIIT APRILIS 13 ANNO DOM 
I714 & ^TATIS SUJE, 72. 
. MORTUUS, SED IMMORTALIS 
HE THAT WOULD TRY 
WHAT IS TRUE HAPPINESS INDEED 
MUST DIE 



46 fis^hicl Cbeever 

ten upon the death of another schoolmaster, John Wood- 
mancy. Dr. Samuel A. Green, of the Massachusetts 
Historical Society, in his contribution of the elegy to 
the Proceedings of the Society (Second Series, Volume 
v.), thinks that without doubt Mr. Woodmancy was a 
master in the Latin School, though he had been unable 
to connect him either with Robert Woodmansey, head 
master of the school, who died in 1667, or with John 
Woodmancy, merchant, who died in 1684. At least 
the subject of this elegy was a schoolmaster in Boston, 
as told by the title: "The Grammarian's Funeral, an 
Elegy composed upon the Death of Mr. John Wood- 
mancy, formerly a schoolmaster in Boston ; But now 
Published upon the Death of the Venerable Mr. Ezekiel 
Chevers the late and famous schoolmaster of Boston in 
New England ; who Departed this Life the twenty-first 
of August 1708, Early in the Morning, In the ninety- 
fourth year of his age." That Mr. Woodmancy taught 
Latin is evident from the tenor of the lines themselves. 
How could otherwise such a personification of Latin 
speech have come into being? 

" Eight Parts of Speech this day wear Mourning Gowns, 

Declined Verbs, Pronouns, Participles, Nouns. 

And not declined, Adverbs and Conjunctions 

In Lillies Torch they stand to do their functions 

With Preposition ; but the most affection 

Was still observed in the Interjection. 

The Substantive seeming the limbed best 

Would set an hand to bear him to his Rest. 

The Adjective with very grief did say, 

Hold me by strength, or I shall faint away. 



Scboolmaeter 47 

The Ponds of Tears did over-cast their faces, 
Yea, all were in most lamentable Cases. 
The five Declensiofts did the Work decline. 
And Told the Pronoun Tu, The w^ork is thine ; 
But in this case those have no call to go 
That want the Vocative and can't say O ! 
The Pronouns said that if the Nouns were there, 
There was no need of them, they might them spare. 
But for the sake of Emphasis they would 
In their Discretion do what ere they could. 
Great honor was conferred on Conjugations^ 
They were to follow next to the Relations. 
Amo did love him best, and Doceo might 
Alledge he was his Glory and Delight, 
But Lego said by me he got his skill, 
And therefore next the Herse I follow will. 
Audio said little, hearing them so hot. 
Yet knew by him much learning he had got. 
O Verbs the Active were, Or Passive sure, 
Su?n to be Neuter could not well endure. 
But this was common to them all to moan 
Their load of grief they could not soon Depone, 
A doleful day for Verbs^ they look so moody, 
They drove Spectators to a mournful study. 
The Verbs irregular, 'twas thought by some, 
Would break no rule, if they were pleased to come. 
Gaudeo could not be found ; fearing disgrace 
He had with-drawn, sent McBceo in his Place. 
Possum did to the utmost he was able. 
And bore as Stout as if he'd been A Table. 
Volo was willing. Nolo somewhat stout. 
But Malo rather chose not to stand out. 
Possum and Volo wished all might afford 
Their help, but had not an Imperative Word. y 

Edo from service would by no means swerve ; 
Rather than fail, he thought the Cakes to Serve. 



48 lejeftiel Cbeever 

Fio was taken in a fit and said 
By him a mournful POEM should be made. 
Fero was willing for to bear a part, 
Altho' he did it with an aking heart. 
Feror excused, with grief he was so Torn, 
He could not bear, he needed to be born. 
Such Nouns and Verbs as we defective find. 
No Grammar Rule did their attendance bind. 
The J were excepted, and exempted hence, 
But Supines^ all did blame for negligence. 
Verbs' Offspring, Participles, hand-in-hand, 
Follow, and by the same direction stand ; 
The rest Promiscuously did croud and cumber 
Such multitudes of each, they wanted Number. 
Next to the Corps to make the attendance even. 
Jove, Mercury, Apollo came from heaven. 
And Virgil, Cato, gods, men, Rivers, Winds 
With Elegies, Tears, Sighs, came in their kinds. 
Ovid from Ponttis hast's apparelled thus 
In Exile-weeds bringing De Tristibus : 
And Homer sure had been among the Rout, 
But that the Stories say his Eyes were out. 
Queens, Cities, Countries, Islands, Come, 
All Trees, Birds, Fishes and each Word in Urn. 
What Syntax here can you expect to find. 
Where each one bears such discomposed mind ? 
Figures of Diction and Construction 
Do little; Yet stand sadly looking on, 
That such a Train may in their notion chord 
Prosodia gives the measure Word for Word. 
Sic Mcestus Cecinit. 

Benj. Tompson." 

It is possible that Mr. Tompson wrote these lines 
while little Cotton Mather was his pupil in the Latin 
School ; for we are told by his biographer-son that 



ScbooIma0ter 49 

before he was " under the famous Mr. Ezekiel Cheever/* 
whom he calls a " very learned, pious man, and an ex- 
cellent schoolmaster," he had been, ** first, under the 
care of Mr. Benjamin Tompson, who," he says, *' was 
a man of great learning and Wit, well acquainted with 
Roman and Greek writers, and a good poet." 

The reference in the Essay in Rhyme to Master Chee- 
ver's being "kindly laid where our God his Granary 
has laid" seems to be confirmed by a small stone, 
marked "Mr. Ezekiel Cheuer," seen today in the Old 
Granary burying-ground, Boston, near the stone of his 
daughter, Susanna Russell.* 

His will, written in 1705, a short time before his wife 
whom he mentions, died, as seen today in the Suffolk 
Probate Office, Boston, was offered by this daughter Su- 
sanna and the son Thomas, a few days after his death. 
In his clear handwriting it reads : — 

" The Last will and Testament of Ezekiel Cheever : 
In Nomine Domini Amen. I Ezekiel Cheever of 
the towne of Boston in the County of Suffolk in New 
England, Schoolmaster, being through great mercy in 
good health & understanding wonderfull in my age, do 
make & ordain this my last will & Testament : as fol- 
loweth. First. I give up my Soule to God my Father 
in Jesus Christ, my body to the earth to be buried in 
a decent manner according to my desire in hope of a 
blessed part in the first resurrection & glorious kingdom 



* In a most extensive research, I find no proof whatever 
for the statement that has been publicly made that he was buried 
in the Roxbury burying-ground, or that afterwards he was 
removed from there to the Cheever tomb in Phipps place on 
Burial Hill, Charlestown. 



50 J63cftiel Cbeever 

of Christ on earth a thousand years. As for my out- 
ward Estate I thus dispose of it. First, I give to my dear 
wife all my household goods & of my plate the two-ear' d 
cup, my least tankard, porringer, a spoon. It : I give 
my son Thomas all my books saving what Ezekiel may 
need & what godly books my wife may desire. It : I 
give to Mary Philips ten pounds. It : I give to my 
grandchild Ezekiel Russell twenty pounds. Item : I 
divide all the rest of my estate into three Parts ; one third 
I give to my dear wife Ellen Cheever, the other two 
thirds to my other children, Samuel, Mary, Elizabeth, 
Ezekiel, Thomas, Susanna, equally part just alike the 
Legacies, debts, & funeral expenses deducted & dis- 
charged. Marie's portion I give to her children as she 
shall dispose. The Land Elizabeth purchased with my 
money I give to her and to her children forever. If my 
wife dies before me, all given her shall be given to 
my six children equally. If any of my children die, 
their portion I give to their children equally. It : I give 
to the poor five pounds as part of my funeral charges. 
It : I make and appoint my dear wife, Ellen Cheever, 
& my two children Thomas and Susanna joint executors 
of this my last will. In witness whereof, I have here- 
unto set my hand and Seal this Sixteenth Day of Febr. 
1705-6. Signed, sealed, declared in presence of Eze- 
kiel Cheever. 

Benjamin Dyer, 

Henry Bridgham, 

Henry Bridgham. ^^ * 

The estate, appraised at £837, 19s. 6d., consisted of 
Purse <& apparel (£46) Household Goods (£165, 
13s. 8d.), Plate (nearly £35), Cash (£245, 9s. 8d.), 
Feasable Bonds (over £400), Debts received (nearly 

£25). 



ScbooIma0ter 51 

The words of Cotton Mather in his memorable sermon 
concerning schoolmasters and the "Blessed Cheever," 
are as true today as when they were uttered. '**Tis 
a justice to them," he said, " that they should be had in 
everlasting Re7nembrance : and a Place and a Name 
among these Just men does particularly belong to that 
Ancient and Honorable Man^ a Master in our 
IsraeW^ He felt that having under him *' Learnt an 
Oration made by Tully in praise of his own master, 
namely, that Pro Archia Poeta^'^ they should not be 
outdone by a " Pagan in our gratitude to our master.'* 
** Neither as an example should the famous Christian in 
the Primitive Times, who wrote a whole Book in praise 
of his Master Hierotheus" be forgotten. Indeed he 
wished more — even a statue to his Master. " Verrius, 
the Master to the Nephews of Augustus ^^^ he was proud 
to say, " had a Statue Erected for him ; and Antoninus 
obtained from the Senate a Statue for his Master Pronto. 
I am sorry that Mine has none." But he comforted 
himself with the thought that " Cato counted it more 
glorious than any Statue to have it asked, Why has he 
none?** He felt that in the '* grateful Memories of his 
Scholars" there had been, and would be, ''^Hundreds 
erected for him." And as with the old Romans, so 
with the new Americans ; grateful memories of Boston 
Latin School scholars for Master Cheever have come 
down the years. Nearly one hundred and eighty years 
after his death, his faithful service was recalled by them 
on the occasion of the two hundred and fiftieth anniver- 
sary of the Latin School, when Dr. Edward Everett Hale 



52 jEseftiel Cbeever 

presided, and its historian, the Rev. Henry F. Jenks, 
John T. Hassam, Henry W. Haynes, Grenville H. Nor- 
cross and others were moving spirits. Robert Grant, as 
poet of the occasion, offered the following tribute : — 

*' Ezekiel Cheever ! would that we knew more 
Of him who lived to teach at ninety-four 
Beside a senile but historic knee 
The fathers of the men who made us free. 
Perpetuated by a Mather's pen 
His pious learning prompts his countrymen 
To cast a backward glance on history's page, 
And reverence the Nestor of his age. 
Within the sacred shade the chapel flings, 
Called ' Stone ' by patriots, and by Tories * King's,' 
He reared his scholars on the deeds of Rome 
To emulate antiquity at home. 
And drew for salary, as the Records say, 
The rental of Deer Island down the Bay. 
When Death had taken Cheever to himself, 
Nathaniel Williams had his place and pelf." 

But this was not enough. The orator of the occasion, 
Phillips Brooks, desired more, even a visible remem- 
brance ; he could not but remember what Cotton Mather 
had said, — that when scholars saw what Quirimis put on 
his Monument for his Master, *' Invisunt Locum Stud" 
iosi Juvenes frequenter^ ut hoc Exemplo JSdocti^ 
quantum., Discipuli ipsi prceceptoribus suis debeant., 
perpetuo fneminisse velint.,^^ they learnt from the 
sight what ** acknowledgments were due from Scholars 
to their Masters.'* So he dared hope that the time 
would come when " some poetic brain would figure to 
itself, and some hands alert with historical imagination — 



Scboolmaeter 53 

perhaps the same which had bidden John Harvard live 
in immortal youth in Cambridge — vv^ould shape out of 
vital bronze w^hat sort of man the first great school- 
master Ezekiel Cheever was." He felt it would be 
well worth doing, and not be hard for genius to do — for 
'* whoever knows the seventeenth century, will see 
start into life its typical man, the man of prayer, the 
man of faith, the man of duty, the man of God.'* He 
might well have added the inscription appropriate for 
such which Mather told of being on the monument 
Aristotle set up for his Master Plato — '* He was one 
whom all good men ought to imitate as well as to 
celebrate/' 

The days went by. No genius took up the work. 
But in 1899, nearly two hundred years after Master 
Cheever ceased his labors on earth, the Boston Latin 
School Association, of the same school he honored with 
his service, placed in its building on Warren Avenue 
through the generosity of Mr. Grenville H. Norcross, a 
tablet inscribed as follows : — 

Ezekiel Cheever 
hvivs scholae praeceptor 

PER ANNOS PROPE OCTO ET TRIGINTA 

LONDINII NATVS A. D. MDCXIV VIII KAL FEB. 

IBI EDVCATVS IN SCHOLA CHRISTS HOSPITAL DICTA 

IN NVMERVM CIVIVM ACADEMICORVM COLLEGH 

EMMANVEL IN VNIVERSITATE CANTABRIGIENSI 

ASCITVS A. D. MDCXXXII PRIDIE ID IAN 

HANG PETIIT TERRAM A. D. MDCLXXVIII ID IAN 

PRAEPOSITVS HVIC SCHOLAE A. D. MDCXXXVII 

OBIT A. D. MDCCVIII XII KAL SEPT. 

VIXIT PIE ANNIS LXXXXIV 

COTTON MATHER DISCIPVLVS GRATVS HVIC 

OMNEM NOVAE ANGLIAB ERVDITIONEM ASCRIPSIT. 



54 jejeftlel Cbeever 

And today it is gratifying to see in the city of New 
Haven, where Master Cheever not only began his voca- 
tion as teacher but which he helped to found, a large 
brick schoolhouse on the corner of Lombard and Fil- 
more Streets, bearing on its front since its opening in 
1897, the honored name, Ezekiel Cheever, 



w 

N 
W 
?^ 

w 

n 

w 
w 
< 

o 

O 

o 

X 

c 
c 

(X 

w 
w 

> 

<! 

H 
^^ 

O 

o 
:^ 
:^ 




Hppenbtx 



Hppenbir 
I. 

Latin letters of Ezekiel Cheever to his son, the Rev. 
Samuel Cheever, of Marblehead : — 

BosTONij Nov. 24° hora 10* vesp. 

Chare fili : Accepi ab hospite epistolium tuum 24° Nov. 
post festum, ex quo priores firas te salutasse literas, interci- 
dentibus nulHs, cognosco, Optatum iter hora instituta perfeci. 
Cant, ad patrem profectus sum. Quern vero a fronte quaerebam, 
a tergo Bostonij inscius reliqui. Ne tamen iter ex toto infelix 
et invitum esset, visum est negotium cum matre comunicare ; 
quam etiam si rem totam celassem, subverebar ne ipsam aliena 
et minus amicam haberem. Ex colloquio intellexi duos prius 
tibi significatos virginem petijsse, quoru neutr. vel addicta, vel 
facilis ee videtur. Ista objecit in illis, uno saltern, quae in te 
non competunt. Mater nihil impedimenti praestruxit, sed via 
apertam, et aditum liberum ut sperem, induxit. Totum tamen 
negotium marito et filiae coiTiittendum censuit. Valedicens 
tandem domum redeo. In reditu ecce, obviam venit quern 
quaerebam, ftelix interpretabar auspicium occursum ejus. Virum 
aggressus sum, comiter salutavi, paucis itineris causam dixi, et 
quicquid in rem visum est, de fortunis tuis narro, interna ali- 
orum jvidicio et testimonio mandans. Amice me tractavit vir 
prudens vultu et voce. Ne verbum quidem alienum et adversum. 
Sed totum consilium ad filiae sententiam referebat. Hoc tamen 
mihi exoranti concessit, ut ipse Bost. revertens (quod fore sub 
mediam septimanam credebat) me domi meae conveniret, et de 
toto negotio certiorem faceret. Ex quo ipsum non vidi, nee 
quicqua audiva ; sed in boras singulas expecto. Quid quaeris ? 
Si me audis, quae apparent invitare videntur omnia. Successus 
est penes Deum. Prudens futuri temporis exitum caliginosa 



58 Hppen&ir 

nocte premit deus. Qui jubet, et melius, quam tu tibi, consulat, 
opto. Si quid interea clarius eluxerit, modo nuncius contingat, 
tibi praemittam. Haec caenatus et dormitans scripsi. Vale. 
Nos adventu tuu maturum et jucundu expectamus. 

Tui studiosissi : pater 

Ez : Cheever. 

This other letter, dated Charlestown, Dec. 31st, 1669, 
was found after the death of the Rev. John Eliot, D.D., 
of Boston (to whom it was given by a descendant of the 
schoolmaster, the Rev. Isaac Mansfield of Marblehead), 
and, later, presented to the Massachusetts Historical 
Society ; — 

DuLCE Caput : Redditae mihi sunt pridie quae ad me dedisti 
hospiti literae, ex quibus judicium et consilium tuum facilfe 
perspexi, nee contemnendum esse puto. Hiberna itinera sunt 
semper injucunda, plerum autem gravia, et molesta, viatori 
praecipu^ moll! et inexperto. In magnis negotijs salubris est 
cautela, mora tamen periculosa, saepe lethalis. Cavendum est, 
ne praeda, quam secteris, in alienos incidat casses. Num virgo 
sic procorum expers, et nulli obnoxia, me quidem praeterit. 
Nee res est tuli indagini matura. Hoc unicum accepi. Multi 
illam peti6re, ilia aversata petentes. Causam vero repudij 
prorsus ignoro. Prior morum et virtutis fama novis ornatur 
testimonijs, et receptae fidei authoribus. Laudum tamen splen- 
dor hac nubecula obumbratur, ipsa scilicet, (asserente quadam 
vicina) parca nimis et tenax esse videtur. Quod vitium fallit 
specie virtutis et umbra. D* Haitiond inter sermones de te, et 
tuo conjugio ortos, quos cum hospite vestra apud se pernoctante 
habuit, exconjectura temere affirmavit, te domi, non foras spon- 
sam reperturum. Quod dictum vestra silentio excepit. Nihil 
praeter auditum habeo, sed ipse vir, audiente uxore, banc fabulam 
recitavit. Divino, consilio te totum trade, et coelestis provi- 



Hppen&ix 59 

dentiae vestigijs inhaere, et ad optatum exitum pervenies. Nihil 
aliud, quod scribam, occurrit. Tui omnes valent, et te ex 
animo salutant. Plura coram, et otiosus. Vale. 

Dat : Dec : ultimo. 69. 

Carolotonia. Tui amantissimus Pater 

Ez : Cheever. 

Hospiti tuae me omnino excusatu habe, quod ilia in equo 
transeuntem, et me comiter appellante, in aedes ne quidem in- 
vitavi, putavi n. ipsa Bost ; euntem ne descensura, instante 
nocte, et revera uxore condelis condendis occupata, nee ipsa erat 
visu facilis, nee domus hospitio idonea. 

These 
For his dear son Samuel 
Cheever 

at Marblehead. 
II. 

Br* Mtlliam Hmea 

Dr. William Ames (1576-1633), or Amesius, as the Dutch call 
him, was for years a valued professor in the Franeker University 
in Friesland, which, dating from 1585, and closed by Napoleon 
in 181 1, was noted for its enthusiastic recognition of the Ameri- 
cans in their struggle for liberty. The theological writings of 
this Cambridge graduate in various editions are still read in the 
Netherlands. Cotton Mather, in his Magnalia^ refers to his 
controversies with John Robinson, when, in his " younger time," 
he published treatises, and made no scruple to call the incom- 
parable Dr. Ames himself Dr. Amiss for opposing such a degree 
of separation as he then advocated. Being later convinced, how- 
ever, by this " learned antagonist," he came to retract what his 
mistaken zeal had advocated. Mather also refers to Dr. Ames' 
friendship with Thomas Hooker, a founder of the Hartford 
Colony, and tells that when Mr. Hooker was called to Rotter- 
dam, he the "more heartily and readily accepted," because it 



6o HppenMx 

renewed his acquaintance with his invaluable Dr. Ames, who 
had newly left his place in the Frisian University. With him 
he spent the residue of his time in Holland, and assisted him in 
composing some of his discourses, which are, " His Fresh Suit 
Against the Ceremonies" ; for such was the regard which Dr. 
Ames had for him, that, notwithstanding his vast ability and 
experience, yet when it came to the "narrow of any question 
about the instituted worship of God," he would still profess him- 
self conquered by Mr. Hooker's reason, declaring that though 
he had been acquainted tvith many scholars of divers nations, 
yet he never met with Mr. Hooker's equal, either for preaching 
or for disputing. And such was the regard which on the other 
side he had for Dr. Ames, that he would say, '* If a scholar was 
but well studied in Dr. Ames, his Medulla Theologiae and Casus 
Conscieniias, so as to understand them thoroughly, they would 
make him (supposing him versed in the scriptures) a good 
divine, though he had no more books in the world." After this 
Mr. Hooker went to Boston. Dr. Ames had a design to follow, 
but death prevented; or, as Cotton Mather says, he was "on 
the wing for this American desert, but God then took him to 
the heavenly Canaan." But his widow and three children — 
William, John and Ruth — came to New England, where, "having 
her house burnt, and being reduced into much poverty and afflic- 
tion, the charitable heart of Mr. Hooker, and others who joined 
with him, upon advice thereof, comfortably provided for them." 
(Book in, Magnalia.') The General Court of Massachusetts 
gave forty pounds to her, — " the widow of Dr. Ames of famous 
memory." She had also a grant of land that year (1637) in 
Salem, where she lived ere moving to Cambridge. Motley tells 
us that the family library was used in the education of American 
youth. This recognition of the widow of a man who never 
stepped on American soil argues to the feeling felt for him. 
Cotton Mather calls him the " Phoenix of his age." He recalls 
the farewell words to him of Mr. Paul Bayne when he was about 
leaving his native England for Holland. Perceiving him to be 
a man of extraordinary parts, he said: "Beware of a strong 



HppenMx ei 

head and a cold heart. It is rare for a scholastical wit to be 
joined with an heart warm in religion." He was forced to 
declare, however, that this was not the case with him. 



III. 

^Boston Xatin Scbool 

(From Education of June, 1903.) 
EDWARD EVERETT HALE, D.D., BOSTON, MASS. 

The graduates of this School, if they know anything about it, 
are in the habit of saying that their School is the oldest School 
in the United States. By this they mean that no other School 
organization now existing in America can trace its existence, 
from year to year, back to a period so early as the 13th day of 
February, 1635, when at a meeting of the more intelligent people 
in Boston, this School was established. Philemon Pormort or 
Portmort, Pormont, Portmont, Permont, Purmount, was ap- 
pointed as Master. The official spelling, as the School Cata- 
logue shows it, is Pormort. He seems himself to have spelled 
the name in various ways. He was one of the conscientious men 
whom we rejected in the ecclesiastical fury which was aroused 
by the preaching of Anne Hutchinson and other intelligent and 
unintelligent assistants of hers. In the frenzy which led to this 
banishment of some of the best citizens of Boston, Pormort 
shared the fate of many excellent men. 

I am at the present time, 1903, President of the Boston Latin 
School Association, which is made up from the graduates of the 
School. I received a letter not long since from a gentleman in- 
terested in the oldest school in Albany. He challenged our 
right to say that we were the oldest school in America, and cited 
the authorities which show that the founders of Albany had 
established a school before 1635. To which I replied that I did 
not doubt this ; that there were undoubtedly schools in Virginia 
or in Plymouth before 1635 ; that I supposed there were schools 



62 appenMr 

in St. Augustine and Santa Fe long before that. But I said that 
neither at Albany, in Virginia, in Florida, or in New Mexico had 
any one shown the existence of a school in those early periods 
which has been continually carried on from those times to this 
time. 

Much closer to us is the Town of Dorchester, which is now a 
part of the municipality of Boston. The people of Dorchester 
in the year 1639, passed a vote taxing the owners of Thompson's 
Island — which was part of their territory — "for the maintenance 
of a School in Dorchester." The antiquarians of that town say 
that this is the earliest record of public taxation for education. 
Our Pormort money was raised by subscription and not by taxa- 
tion. All the same our School seems to have been managed by 
the town meeting from the beginning. 

It is evident from the Dorchester and from the Boston records 
that the hope and wish of the leaders was, that certain special 
properties, like Deer Island and Thompson's Island, should be 
set apart as the " foundation " of these schools. But this system, 
borrowed from the old country, soon gave way, and all the 
schools were supported by taxation. As late as 1652, Rev. John 
Cotton of the First Church left half of his estate to the support 
of a Free School in Boston, under conditions named by him. 

What we of the Boston Latin School say to our Dorchester 
friends is that they have not in Dorchester any list of the Mas- 
ters of their school from that day to this day, such as we have, 
and they cannot name to us any one of the Dorchester public 
Schools which, as our Episcopal friends would say, can show an 
unbroken Pedagogical Succession. 

The name of Philemon Pormort does not appear in the cata- 
logue of either Oxford or the English Cambridge. His immedi- 
ate successor in the School was Daniel Maude, who was a Master 
of Arts of Emanuel in Cambridge ; and after him in rapid suc- 
cession came John Woodbridge, who was of Oxford, Robert 
Woodmansey, Benjamin Tompson, a poet of his day, a Harvard 
graduate of 1662, Ezekiel Cheever, who learned his Latin at 
Christ's Hospital in England. With Tompson and Cheever the 



HppenMx 63 

history of the School connects itself with the lives of the leaders 
of the Colony. 

I used to encourage the belief among our boys that Cheever 
and Milton were fellow-students in St. Paul's School in London. 
I went so far as to make an unfortunate offer to give some prize, 
I forget what, to anybody who could prove that Ezekiel Cheever 
blacked John Milton's boots, or in any way served him as fag at 
school. But it proved that the two boys did not even go to the 
same school. I have been more shy of my historical prizes from 
that day to this. Would it have been better perhaps to have 
doubt than certainty? However this may have been, Cheever 
came to this country as early as 1637. He was in Davenport's 
Seven Pillared State at New Haven. The New Haven people are 
proud of him as we are. Perhaps through Davenport's influence, 
when he came from New Haven, at the eager request of our First 
Church in Boston, Cheever also removed from Connecticut to 
Massachusetts, and here "the dear old man," as they called him, 
lived to a great age. He was first a teacher at Ipswich and 
Charlestown, and then was invited to take charge of our Boston 
School. Judge Sewall was one of his friends, and in a modest 
way intimates that he and some of the rest of them contributed 
a sort of old age pension to the decline of the old man's years. 

Following him as a Master for twenty-six years, was Nathaniel 
Williams, whose name, like that of Tompson's, will be found 
among the earlier poets, so-called, of the infant State. He also 
lived to a good old age. He had but little more than six months 
in which to teach Franklin Latin. And Franklin speaks of him 
somewhere with respect. Franklin was himself withdrawn from 
this School to that other university known as a tallow chandler's 
shop, in which he went on with all the practical learning which 
made him of so much use for nearly a century. His statue now 
stands in what was the school yard at the time when Franklin 
played marbles, and it is, according to me, the best of the bronze 
statues in public places in Boston. 

Nathaniel Williams was immediately succeeded in the office of 
Head Master by John Lovell. John Lovell, for the last years of 



64 Hppent)ir 

his administration, had as his principal assistant his own son 
James Lovell. When the American Revolution approached, in 
the times which tried men's souls, John Lovell held to his King 
and to the gentlemen who represented his King in the local gov- 
ernment of the State, not yet new born, while James Lovell, the 
son, was on the Patriot side. Harrison Gray Otis, afterwards 
Senator of the United States, told me in 1840, how he himself, a 
little boy of nine years old, entered the schoolroom in School 
Street, on the 19th of April, 1775, just in time to hear old Lovell 
say, "War's begun and School's done, deponite libros." This 
shows that they still used the Latin language in the work of the 
School. It also shows a certain fear on Lovell's side that the 
pupils would not have understood if Lovell had said, " Initium 
belli., scholcejints." 

At all events, he did not say that. Otis went home and did 
not go to school again till the Evacuation of Boston, March, 
1776. Samuel Hunt, the Master of the North Grammar School, 
was then ordered to take charge of our School, and he remained 
in office till 1805. After his death William Biglow reigned, 
whose name is still recollected as the author of some good Maca- 
ronic poetry. Then came Benjamin Apthorp Gould, Frederic 
Percival Leverett, Charles Knapp Dillaway, Epes Sargent Dix- 
well, Francis Gardner, Augustine Milton Gay, Moses Merrill, 
and Arthur I. Fiske, who have been the Head Masters of the 
School. In many of these cases the Head Master has continued 
his direction of the School for a large part of his life. 

It has had at times alinost a national reputation. Boys were 
sent from a distance, even from other provinces, to have the ad- 
vantage of its discipline. It is one of our boasts at the School 
that five of the forty-five signers of the Declaration of Independ- 
ence were our boys. These were Benjamin Franklin, Samuel 
Adams, Robert Treat Paine, John Hancock, and William Hooper, 
of North Carolina. 

The founders of this School in the seventeenth century were 
educated English gentlemen. Under the lead of the same men, 
and men like them, the General Court of the Colony established 



HppenMx 65 

the Public School system of Massachusetts, which is, I suppose, 
the first Public School system established by law in the world 
after the decay of the schools in Sybaris and the other Greek 
cities of Southern Italy and of Sicily. Of the State of Thurii, 
planted on the foundations of Sybaris, it is recorded that under 
the laws of Charondas, "All citizens should be instructed in 
letters, the city paying the salaries of the teachers. For he held 
that the poor, not being able to pay their teachers from their 
own property, would be deprived of the most valuable discipline." 
I have met with no similar record of Legislation till the act of 
the General Court to which I refer. The founders of the Latin 
School undoubtedly had in mind the English Grammar Schools 
of their own time ; and where they speak of the Free Schools of 
those days, they do not mean necessarily schools in which the 
pupils paid no scot to the teacher or to the government of the 
school. The English term Free School meant then and means 
now, a school to which any boy might be sent on equal terms 
with any other boy. That is to say, the English Free School, 
so called, corresponded and corresponds with any "academy" 
in New England. The word means that it was not a school for 
the cutlers' guild, or the shoemakers' guild, or any other guild, 
nor was it a school under the patronage of this or that college or 
church, but it was a school "free" for any person who wished 
to send his son there, subject to the conditions of the establish- 
ment. In a Democratic colony like Massachusetts, which was 
in fact a Democratic State from the very beginning, a Free 
School soon came to mean a school which was supported at the 
public charge. But in the beginning the pupils themselves or 
their parents paid more or less toward the cost of the conduct of 
the school. Well down in the eighteenth century, the parents 
were assessed for the wood which was burned in the school fires, 
and to a period comparatively recent, the boys themselves were 
expected to make the fires, to sweep out the schoolroom and to 
do other similar services. So far removed were they from the 
customs of our times — where it has been truly said of one of our 
larger cities, that the janitors of the Public Schools have more 



66 appenbix 

to do with their management than the School Committee has. 
On the other hand, every boy in Massachusetts might present 
himself at the town school. Ours was at first the only public 
school in the town. As population increased, and the demand 
increased, another free grammar school was opened at the North 
End, so that the two were designated as the North Free Gram- 
mar School and the South Free Grammar School ; the word 
grammar implying not that English Grammar was taught, for 
it was not, but that Latin and Greek were taught, and the boys 
obtained a considerable facility in the use of the ancient languages. 
Indeed the requisition of the Colonial law, which is so often 
cited, is a requisition for such schools as prepare boys for col- 
lege ; the primitive notion being that Satan could be resisted by 
a proper knowledge of the Greek and Latin languages in which 
were contained the weapons for the fight against him. In study- 
ing the lives and histories of the men who inade the American 
Revolution, and who afterwards carried the commerce of America 
into every seaport of the world, you will get a glimpse every now 
and then of the result of the early education in such a Grammar 
School. I mean by this, that there is more evidence of an ac- 
quaintance with the Latin and Greek classics in the writings of 
those men than there is in the writings of an equal number of 
men of affairs today. Governor Hancock, who signed the Dec- 
laration of Independence, as Governor of Massachusetts main- 
tained a fine hospitality, and received at his house the French 
officers of D'Estaing's Fleet, when that Fleet lay in Boston Har- 
bor. But Hancock could not speak French, and there are anec- 
dotes on record which intimate that he did speak Latin with the 
gentlemen whom he met there. There was in that century un- 
doubtedly, more occasion for maintaining a colloquial knowledge 
of the language than there is now. And while Franklin never 
makes a quotation from the Latin or the Greek, and while he 
speaks of the few months at our Latin School as containing all 
his school education in such matters, it has seemed to me that 
there is evidence that he was acquainted with the Latin Classics. 
I think he knew what the famous epigram meant which says of 



appen&tx 67 

him, " Eri;puit coelo fulmen sceptruinque tyramits.'''' He did not 
object to the Latin inscriptions on the Continental Medals. 

Ezekiel Cheever wrote and printed, '* The Accidence," a Latin 
Grammar which was used in our schools nearly to the end of the 
century in which he died. There were one or two traces of such 
books in Adam's Latin Grammar, which in Mr. Gould's edition 
of it was the book put into the hands of schoolboys as late as 
1830; a book without any philological value, but to this hour not 
a bad monument of what was the scholastic treatment of the 
Latin language. It would seem as if the boys of the eighteenth 
century carried their Latin reading before entering college quite 
as far as such reading is carried now. 

Even a rough computation of the population of Boston and the 
pupils in the two Latin Schools, shows that some knowledge of 
the classical languages must, on the whole, have been an accom- 
plishment much more general in 1750 than now in any com- 
mercial city of America. That is to say, in a town of fifteen 
thousand people, there were at any given moment more than two 
hundred boys in attendance at these schools. Now, the whole of 
what we call the school population of Boston, if we speak of 
boys only, would have been fifteen hundred boys of all ages from 
five to sixteen. Of the ages from ten to sixteen, when they 
would have attended Latin Schools, there can hardly have been 
more than seven hundred boys in the town. Now in fact, it 
seems that two hundred of these boys were studying the Latin 
language. They had enough knowledge of it, at least, to put 
away their books when John Lovell used to say, " Deponite 
Itbrosy They had so much knowledge of it that a member of 
the Legislature would not have been afraid to make a quotation 
in the Latin language. On the other hand I think no one would 
say today that one third of such boys of Boston or New York 
have had training in Latin or in Greek. Perhaps this knowledge, 
even superficial, of the Latin shows its result in the literature of 
the time. I have thought that one detected Latin idioms in the 
English of the Revolution which he would not find in the lead- 
ing editorials of today. 



68 HppenMi 

From 1776, when the two Latin Schools were united, in the 
extreme stringenc}^ of the times, to the year 1816, when Benjamin 
Apthorp Gould was made the Head Master of the School, is the 
period when the record of the School as a force in the public edu- 
cation is comparatively poor. I have wondered whether the 
eager and strenuous mercantile life of the town, turning from 
being a ship building town with some interest in the Fisheries, 
into a rich and commercial city, did not for the moment show 
itself in a diminishing interest in classical study. But with 
wealth and commerce with all the world, the interest of the larg- 
est education asserted itself. The School Committee of Boston 
adopted measures to '* give an additional impulse to the school." 
The most important of the changes made was a regulation "re- 
newing the ancient usage of the school," that boys should be 
admitted only once a year. This regulation has been retained 
to this time. The greatest credit is due to the executive ability 
and to the careful learning of Benjamin Apthorp Gould, who at 
the age of twenty-seven was appointed the Head Master of the 
School, and after the new arrangement was made, he placed 
it at once at the very head of classical instruction in New 
England. 

Mr. Gould's five essays, published in five successive annual 
numbers of what is known as the Prize Book, are dignified dis- 
cussions of methods of education, and, in especial, of the prog- 
ress of what is called Classical Education. The title of the book 
itself indicates the renewal of interest in the careful school Avork. 
Some prizes had been instituted, in the fashion of the day, for 
the best work done in the school. The essays or translations 
which the boys made were printed, or some of them were, as 
indication to the world of Boston of what their boys could do. 
It is interesting now to find the names of Robert C. Winthrop, 
Charles Sumner, Wendell Phillips, and James Freeman Clarke 
put in print for the first time as they appeared at the ages of 
thirteen or fourteen among the competitors for School Prizes. 
Mr. Sumner received two prizes in 1824 ; one for a translation 
from Sallust and one for a translation from Ovid. In printing 



Hppenbix eg 

these essays, Mr. Gould would make a handsome book with the 
results of his own studies on what we now call the higher educa- 
tion. The dignity and prestige which the School had at that 
time was not easily lost. The school authorities of the city have 
always been proud of it, and have maintained a line of teachers 
whose work is well known among the people who take any inter- 
est in the history of American schools. Mr. Frederic Percival 
Leverett was the accomplished and accurate author of a Latin 
Lexicon which in one form or another still holds a place ainong 
the working books of Latin Schools. Francis Gardner, who 
was for forty years head master of the School, abridged this 
Lexicon so that it might be used more conveniently, and his 
work held its place in use till quite recently. Mr. Leverett's im- 
mediate successor was Charles Knapp Dillaway. I was one of 
his pupils, and it happened to me, therefore, to be called to assist 
in the services at his funeral. He died in 1889. He had been a 
schoolboy in this very school, when he was nine years old, and 
his connection with the Public Schools of Boston had been un- 
interrupted except by the four years that he spent in Harvaid 
College, from the time when he was nine years old till the time 
when he died. That is to say, in the two hundred and forty-nine 
years of the history of Boston, this gentleman had been more or 
less closely connected with our education here for more than a 
quarter of the time. He was then the working member of the 
Trustees of the Roxbury Latin School. So recent is what we 
call our ancient history. 

Mr. Dillaway was followed in his charge by Epes Sargent Dix- 
well, a grandson of Hunt, who was one of the earlier teachers. 
Mr. Dixwell had every qualification for such a post. He was 
intelligently enthusiastic about the Latin language and its litera- 
ture. He is the only old man whom I remember, who till after 
he had passed four score years wrote on any fit occasion his little 
Horatian ode in the Latin language. Some unfortunate disa- 
greement with some committee now forgotten led him to resign 
his place and to establish a private school for precisely the pur- 
pose of the Boston Latin School, which has led the way in several 



70 Hppenbix 



private schools which have maintained the standard of scholar- 
ship which Mr. Gould and Mr. Leverett had fixed at our School. 
Mr. Dixwell's immediate successor was Francis Gardner. I 
speak of him with regard, not to say tenderness, because I was a 
pupil under him, and like all of his other pupils I had a great 
respect, not simply for his knowledge of the Classics, but for 
the moral standard of life which he held before us. I have often 
said in public addresses that at the time when I was a schoolboy, 
there was no boy in school that would have dared to tell a lie. 
The moral tone of the School was so high that any liar would 
have been sent to Coventry, and a boy who had transgressed 
would have compelled his father to take him away from the igno- 
miny which awaited him in the school room. Mr. Gardner him- 
self was severe in his dealings with laziness or with anything 
which offended his sense of morals. But as the schoolboys say, 
he was "fair," and every boy under his rather strict administra- 
tion recognized the fact that the law was the same for one as for 
another, and that Gardner's favor was to be won simply by in- 
dustry and purity of life. He had no veneration for the person 
whose success was simply in working out the difference between 
the Subjunctive and the Optative. On Mr. Gardner's death, for 
a few months only Mr. Augustine Milton Gay was the Head Mas- 
ter. Mr. Moses Merrill, the sub-master, succeeded him as Head 
Master, and on his resignation, the present principal, a sub- 
master, was promoted in the same way. The School has noth- 
ing to fear in his administration of it. 

Such are the condensed annals of the oldest school in America. 
Unfortunately, its catalogues from 1635 to 1730 were not pre- 
served. It is due to the diligent affection of the alumni of the 
last generation that there have been collected from the family 
traditions and the histories of Massachusetts the names of some 
of the boys who were trained there. That list begins with John 
Hull, the goldsmith who stamped the silver of Massachusetts 
when she assumed that royal prerogative in 1652. On the same 
list is the name of Benjamin Franklin, who has made an affec- 
tionate allusion to the School in his Autobiography. 



HppenMx 71 

As soon as John Lovell was made the Master, the regular 
catalogue of the School began, which lasted all through his dy- 
nasty. The earlier a boy presented himself at Lovell's house 
for examination, the better was his chance for a good seat in the 
schoolroom, so that the little fellows rose early on that morning 
and reported there just below the schoolhouse in hope of obtain- 
ing this privilege. On the catalogue of Harvard College for the 
same year, the boys were rated according to the social rank of 
their parents. But under the more democratic system of the 
Town of Boston, the boy who rose earliest in the morning and 
washed his face earliest and arrived at Lovell's house earliest, is 
first upon the list. This list fortunately was preserved by Lovell 
and his son. It breaks off with the American Revolution, and 
again the complete catalogue list of the School is broken. But 
with Mr. Gould's more accurate history it begins again, and we 
have the names of thousands upon thousands of the alumni of 
the School, for many of whom it was the only University. They 
have extended a knowledge of it to all parts of the country. The 
boys of the School to this day are proud of course that five of 
their own number were among the forty-five signers of the Dec- 
laration of Independence. Indeed, we are fond of saying that 
what the old writing masters used to call " the Boston style of 
writing " may be traced among the signatures of the nation's 
charter. 

The Hall of Fame in New York has twenty-nine names agreed 
upon by ninety-seven judges. It does not include any person 
who had died after 1890. Of the twenty-nine names who received 
the majority of votes, three or four were Latin School boys, — 
Benjamin Franklin, Ralph Waldo Emerson, perhaps Samuel 
Breese Morse, and Henry Ward Beecher. And William Ellery 
Channing was on our school Committee in the days of Gould. 
These five names are in a list of Heroes which can afford to omit 
our Samuel Adams, John Hancock and Charles Sumner. 



72 HppenMr 



IV. 

jfunetal Sermon ot 1Re\>» 3obn JBarnarb on 
1Rcv* Samuel Cbeerer 

The funeral sermon Rev. John Barnard preached on 
that *'aged and faithful servant of God," the Rev. 
Samuel Cheever, of Marblehead, under the title, 
"Elijah's Mantle," was printed in Boston by " S. 
Gerrish near the Brick Meeting-House in Cornhill 1724." 
(Found in the Boston Public Library.) 

After generalizing somewhat on the text, II. Kings 
ii. 14, he finishes the sermon as follows : — 

And this leads me into the mournful Theme which this day 
calls for, occasioned by the removal of that Man of God, the 
aged Reverend Mr. Samuel Cheever, from among us. It pleased 
God, from whom comes down every good and perfect Gift, to 
furnish him for the work of the Ministry, with no small Abili- 
ties, both natural and acquired, being owner of a solid Judgment, 
a copious Invention, and a tenacious Memory, which were im- 
proved in him, by a due application of himself to Reading, 
Meditation and Prayer. 

God brought him among you some time in November, 1668, 
from which Time, those of you that are advanced in Years, 
know how much he has been a common Father to the whole 
Town, in the many temporal Advantages which you have 
received from him ; he truly went about doing good, and serving 
you in all your Interests. 

But as preaching is peculiarly the Minister's Work, so he was 
well fitted herefor by an uncommon Knowledge in the Holy 
Scripture, being an excellent Text-man, and carrying a Body of 
Divinity in his Head, which he Avould often say to me, it was 
good for a Divine to be well furnished withal. 



appen&ir 73 



In his publick Discourses to jou he endeavored to preserve 
the truth, purity and simplicity of the Gospel, teaching you the 
Truth as it is in Jesus. He made it his great care to shew you 
your Sin and Danger, and w^here your only Remedy lies ; that 
3'ou might be directed to flee from the wrath to come, and lay 
hold on the Hope set before you. And as he aimed at the 
winning of Soals to his great Master, so he sought not to please 
your Fancy and tickle your ears with studied Elocution and 
formal Periods, but delivered the Mind of God to you with such 
plainness and urgency of Argument and Persuasion as becomes 
the Gospel of Christ ; and he shunned not to declare unto you 
the whole Counsel of God. 

And how fervent was he in treating with your immortal 
Souls, delivering himself to you with that flame and heart, that 
earnestness, and vigour which shewed his sincere Zeal in his 
Master's Service, and his hearty desire that you all might be 
saved. He plainly shewed the lively Impressions of the Truths 
he preached to you upon his own Heart, while the fervency of 
his Voice pierced your ears, that the united Light and Heat 
might strike the more forcibly upon your Minds, and gain the 
more ready Compliance with the great Truths that were delivered 
to you. 

And he was as constant and assiduous, as fervent and zealous 
a Preacher of the Word of God among you ; so that, if I mistake 
not, from his first coming among you until the time that Age 
had worn him out, you never were, more than once, without the 
constant Entertainments of your Sabbaths, your stated Feasts 
and your New Moons, tho' he was alone for about 48 Years : 
God so graciously confirmed his Health that for more than 50 
Years he never was hindered from coming to you in the Name 
of the Lord by any Sickness. 

Indeed, the infirmities of Age obliged him to take leave of his 
publick stated Exercises in October, 1719, which he did, from 
those Words of our Saviour, John ix. 4, " I must work the works 
of him that sent me while it is day ; the night cometh when no 
man can work." And yet, about a Year after this, upon a special 



74 Hppen&ix 



Occasion, he entertained us with a short but plain and fervent 
Excitement, to be Zealovis of Good Works. 

While his strength and vigour continued he was a very just 
and methodical Preacher (and doubtless had he been fixed in a 
politer Place he would have made a brighter Figure), tho' in his 
latter days he gave more into an expository way of treating the 
several Texts that occurred in his preaching ; and to the last he 
could make no publick use of Notes, but delivered all memoriter. 

And yet, after Age had laid him aside from publick Labour, 
he was still at his Work, and his Mind so intensely set upon it, 
that I scarce ever came into his Company at any time without 
finding him at his Study, or his Mind taken up with the publick 
Duties of the Sabbath ; and he would be continually expressing 
his concern lest he should not be able to do anything of it, and 
desiring me to prepare for all the Day, lest he should not be able 
to come out, which plainly shewed the hearty Delight he took 
in his Work. 

He was a Man of Peace, of a Catholick Mind, and extensive 
Philanthropy and good Will to all Men, without confining 
Religion to a particular Sect ; a great Peace-maker among his 
contending Neighbors, and never made, or excited Parties, or so 
much as joined himself to any (that I can learn) but those that 
were for God and Religion, against Vice and Immorality. 

His Conversation was grave, yet pleasant, suitable to a steady 
composure of Mind, which he usually enjoyed, though at proper 
Seasons he knew how to be warm. 

His life among you has been the life of a Christian, and the 
whole tenor of it a manifesting an entire Submission to and 
Satisfaction in the disposing Providence of God ; and you your- 
selves are Witnesses how holily and unblameably he hath 
behaved himself, walking before you in the paths of serious 
Godliness, a plain and a humble Man. 

When you called me to the pastoral Office with him, a few 
Years ago, tho' his own Delight in the work of the Lord among 
you made him not so forward as some might have expected, to 
have an Assistant joined with him, yet he evidenced to you an 



appenbtx Ts 

entire Satisfaction in your Proceedings ; and I have cause to 
acknowledge the goodness of God to me herein, that as a Son 
with a Father, so he received me, repeating the Words of good 
old Simeon upon his return to his House from my publick Or- 
dination, ** Now, Lord, lettest thou thy Servant depart in Peace." 

It was a signal and uncommon Favour of God to him, that 
tho' he lived to the Age of fourscore and almost five, yet he had 
so settled a Constitution and firm a Health as to be able to say, 
that he never was Sick in all his Life ; a day's Indisposition and 
some small touches of the Sciatica, he has sometimes known. 
And as his Health was firm, so at upwards of fourscore he could 
read without the help of Spectacles, and had his Hearing quick 
as Youth to the last week of his Life ; but the Powers of his 
Mind, for some few Years before he died, failed, especially his 
memory, whereby he was greatly unfitted even for common Con- 
versation ; and yet his constant Fainily Prayers were orderly 
and regular ; so did Grace shine in the decays of Nature. 

And while the decays of Age laid him by from publick Serv- 
ice, how exemplarily Patient was he under such a Rebuke ? He 
would often say to me : "Age is too heavy for me, but I must 
bear it. I can't die when I would. I must patiently wait God's 
Time ; my Times are in His Hands ; I rejoice to see that God 
has provided for His People before I go. God has satisfied me 
with long life." 

Thus continued he at Work, and patiently submitting to the 
Will of God, till a few days ago his senses wholly left him, and 
the Night before last he died, and truly died ; his Lamp of Life 
fairly burning out, without being put out ; for he felt no Sick- 
ness nor Pain to the last, nor shewed any the least tokens of 
them even in his expiring moments. 

So, while by the Grace of Christ in him, he was secured 
against the Terrours of the second Death, thro' the Favour of 
God to him, he knew nothing of the usual ghastly Harbingers,. 
nor the shocking Terrours of a Natural Death ; but as he was 
always calm and easy, in the possession of a comfortable Hope^ 
without strong emotions of Joy, or the distress of anxious Tears, 



76 HppcnMr 

so he quietly fell asleep in Jesus, and is gone to receive the Re- 
wards of his long and faithful Services. 

I will only add, that the little Time I have had will sufficiently 
apologize, that I have given no better Account of this aged and 
faithful Servant of Jesus Christ ; and yet, such as it is, I know 
his humble, modest Tho'ts of himself would not have been easily 
prevailed upon to have allowed it ; for I well remember, that 
about a Month or two ago, upon my asking him a Question, 
which he happened to misunderstand, he replied to me, with 
some warmth, '* Prithee, don't go about to flatter me ; 'tis eno' 
that I stand to my own Master ; my greatest care is to be ac- 
cepted of him." 

And now may the God of all Grace and Consolation afford 
his most compassionate Regards unto the devout and meek 
Hand-maid of the Lord, who has been the Companion of his 
Days for about fifty-four Years ; comfort her under her Sorrows, 
and give unto her an happy and endless meeting with him in Glory. 

May God be a Father unto the mourning Children, and more 
abundantly enrich them with the Blessings of Goodness, and 
return into their Bosome the many Prayers their ascended 
Father hath laid out for thein. 

May God take care of this bereaved Town and Flock of His, 
and always shower down of the Gifts and Graces of His Spirit 
upon it ; and especially may I take hold of Elijah's Mantle, and 
say, Let a double portion of his Spirit rest upon me. 

My Brethren, call to Mind the Things which you have here- 
tofore heard and learned from your deceased Pastor ; and so let 
aged Samuel, now dead, yet speak unto you ; and be 3'ou follow- 
ers of him wherein he followed Christ. And may God reward 
your Kindness and the good Will of the Town, in the Support 
which, to their Honour, they have continued to afford to him, 
notwithstanding his being called off from Publick Usefulness 
for some Years past. 

Now make your earnest and daily Prayers for your surviving 
Pastor, that he may be strengthened to his Work, and succeeded 
therein. 



Hppenbix 77 

And let it be the care of us all so to live, that we may die in 
Peace, like him that is now gone before us ; that when our Dust 
returns to its Dust, our Spirits may ascend to the Lord God of 
Elijah ; that we and our departed Father, may have a happy 
meeting at the Right Hand ot Christ, that we may be a Crown 
of Rejoicing to him in the Day of the Lord, and he may be able 
to say concerning us, Behold /, and the children -which God has 
graciously given to me; and we may mutually be employed in 
the everlasting Services of the Redeemer, and be together un- 
speakably and forever happy in the possession of the Crown of 
Glory, which fadeth not away. 



The Election Sermon Mr. Cheever preached, May 28, 
171 2, which Drake's History of Boston says was the 
first one preached in the Old South Ciiurch, the others 
having been preached in the First Church, was titled 
thus: '* God's Sovereign Government Among \\\q. Na- 
tions Asserted in a Ser^non Preached before His Excel- 
lency the Governor^ the Honourable Council^ and 
Representations of the Province of the Massachusetts 
Bay in New England on May 28, 171 2, being the 
day for Election of His Majesty's Council for that 
Province. By Samuel Cheever, Pastor of the Church 
in Marblehead. Psal. xcv. 3, 6 (Text in full) ; Psal. 
ii. 12. (Text in full). Boston: Printed by B. Green. 
Sold at the Booksellers Shops. 171 2." 

At a Council held at the Council Chamber in Boston, 
June 23, 1 7 13, it was voted to pay ** Five pounds, two 
shillings and ten pence for printing Mr. Cheever's Elec- 
tion Sermon and making it up." 

In his Autobiography Mr. Barnard refers to Mr. 
Cheever as wholly a '*memoriter preacher." 



78 Hppen&ix 

V. 

Through the marriage of the Rev. Ames Cheever to Sarah 
Choate, of Ipswich — the daughter of "Gov." Thomas Choate, 
of Hog (now Choate) Island — these two prominent pioneer 
families of Essex County were allied. Their descendants have 
filled important positions in the world, as have those of the Rev. 
Thomas Cheever and others of the schoolmaster's children, as 
seen in records given bj John T. Hassam, of Boston, Deloraine 
P. Corej, of Maiden, Elisha D. Eldridge, of Boston, Dr. David 
B. Cheever, of Boston, Mr. Ezekiel Cheever Whitman (who 
changed his name to Ezekiel Cheever), and others who might be 
mentioned. Nor should we forget descendants of Susanna Rus- 
sell, the daughter who ministered to the venerable master in his 
last days. 

VI. 

Hn Bs5ap on tbe /IDemori? ot m^ IDenerable 
[fbastct, i£3C\\icl Cbeever 

BY COTTON MATHER 

Augusto perstrhigere Carmine Laudes. 
^uas nulla Eloquij vis Celebrare queat. 

You that are men & thoughts of manhood know, 
Be Just now to the Man that made you so. 
Martyr'd'by Scholars the stabb'd Cassian dies. 
And falls to cursed Lads a Sacrifice. 
Not so my Cheever ; Not by Scholars slain. 
But Prais'd and Lov'd, and wish'd to Life again. 
A mighty Tribe of Well-instructed Youth 
Tell what they owe to him, and Tell the Truth. 
All the Eight parts of Speech he taught to them 
They now Employ to Trumpet his Esteem, 
They fill Fames Trumpet, and they spread a Fame 
To last till the Last Trumpet drown the same. 



Hppenbir 79 



Magister pleased them well, because 'twas he ; 
Thej saw that Bonus did with it agree. 
While thej said AmOy they the Hint improve 
Him for to make the Object of their Love. 
No Concord so Inviolate they knew 
As to pay Honours to their Master due. 
With Interjections they break off at last, 
But, Ah, is all they use, Wo, and Alas I 
We Learnt Prosodia, but with that Design 
Our Master's Name should in our Verses shine. 
Our Weeping Ovid but instructed us 
To write upon his Death, De Tristibus. 
Tully we read, but still with this Intent, 
That in his praise we might be Eloquent, 
Our Stately Virgil made us but Contrive 
As our Anchises to keep him Alive. 
When Phoenix, to Achilles was assign'd 
A Master, then we thought not Homer blind : 
A Phoenix, which Oh ! might his Ashes shew ! 
So rare a Thing we thought our master too. 
And if we made a Theme, 'twas with Regret 
We might not on his Worth show all our Wit. 

Go on, ye Grateful Scholars to proclame 
To late Posterity your Master's Name. 
Let it as many Languages declare 
As on Loretto-TahXe do appear. 

Too much to be by any one exprest : 

/'//tell my share, and you shall tell the rest. 

Ink is too vile a Liquor ; Liquid Gold 

Should fill the Pen, by which such things are told. 

The Book should Amyanthus-V2i^Q.x be 

All writ with Gold, from all corruption free. 

A Learned Master of the Languages 

Which to Rich Stores of Learning are the Keyes ; 



8o Hppenbix 



He taught us first Good Sense to understand 

And put the Golden Keys into our hand. 

We but for him had been for Learning Dumb, 

And had a sort of Turkish Mutes become. 

Were Grammar quite Extinct, yet at his Brain 

The Candle might have well been lit again. 

If Rhet'rick had been stript of all her Pride 

She from his Wardrobe might have been supplj'd. 

Do but Name Ckeever, and the Echo straight 

Upon that name, Good Latin, will Repeat. 

A Christian Terence, master of the File 

That arms the Curious to Reform their Style. 

Now Rome and Athens from their Ashes rise ; 

See their Platonick Tear with vast surprize : 

And in our School a Miracle is wrought ; 

For the Dead Languages to Life are brought. 

His Work he Lov'd : Oh ! had we done the same ! 

Our Play-dayes still to him ungrateful came. 

And jet so well our Work adjusted Lay, 

We came to Work, as if we came to Play. 

Our Lads had been, but for his wondrous Cares, 

Boyes of my Lady Mores unquiet Pray'rs. 

Sure were it not for such informing Schools, 

Our Lafran too would soon be fill'd with Oivles. 

'Tis Corlefs pains, and Chccver's we must own. 

That thou, JVe-w England, art not Scythia grown. 

The Isles of Silly had o'er-run this Day 

The Continent of our Atnerica. 

Grammar he taught, which 'twas his work to do ; 

But he would Hagar have her place to know^ 

The Bible is the sacred Grammar, where 
The Rules of speaking -well, contained are. 
He taught us Lilly, and he Gospel taught ; 
And us poor Children to our Saviour brought. 
Master of Sentences, he gave us more 



Hppen&ix si 



Than we in our Sententiae had before. 

We Learn't Good Things in Tullies Offices ; 

But we from him Learn't Better things than these. 

With Cato's he to us the Higher gave. 

Lessons of Jesus, that our Souls do save. 

We Constru'd Ovid^s Metamorphosis ^ 

But on ourselves charg'd, not a change to miss. 

Young Austin wept, when he saw Dido dead, 

Tho' not a Tear for a Lost Soul he had ; 

Our Master would not let us be so vain, 

But us from Virgil did to David train, 

Textors Epistles would not Cloathe our Souls ; 

Pauls too we heard ; we ivent to School at Patch. 

Sjrs, Do you not Remember well the Times, 

When us he warn'd against our Youthful Crimes ; 

What Honey dropt from our old Nestors mouth 

When with his counsels he Reform'd our Youth ; 

How much he did to make us Wise and Good ; 

And with what Prayers, his work he did conclude. 

Concern'd that when from him we Learning had, 

It might not Armed Wickedness be made ! 

The Suit shall first the Zodiac forsake. 

And Stones unto the Stars their Flight shall make ; 

First shall the Summer bring large drifts of Snoiv, 

And beauteous Cherries in December grow ; 

Ere of those Charges we Forgetful are 

Which we, O man of God, from thee did hear. 

Such Tutors to the Little Ones would be. 
Such that in Flesh we should their Angels see ; 
Ezehiel should not be the Name of such; 
We'd Agathafigelus not think too much. 

Who Serv'd the School, the Church did not forget ; 
But Thought, and Pray'd, and often wept for it. 



82 HppenMx 



Mighty in Prayer: How did he wield thee, Pray'r! 

Thou Reverst Thunder : Christ's-Sides-piercing spear? 

Soaring we saw the Bird of Paradise: 

So Wing'd by Thee, for Flights beyond the Skies. 

How oft we saw him tread the Milky Way, 

Which to the Glorious Throne of Mercy lay ! 

Come from the Mount, he shone with ancient Grace, 

Awful the Splendor of his Aged Face. 

Cloath'd in the Good Old Way, his Garb did wage 

A War with the Vain Fashions of the Age, 

Fearful oi nothing more than hateful Sin ; 

'Twas that from which he laboured all to win, 

Zealous ; And in Truths Cause ne'r known to trim ; 

No Neuter Gender there allow'd by him. 

Stars but a Thousand did the Ancients know ; 

On later Globes they Nineteen hundred grow ; 

Now such a Cheever added to the Sphere 

Makes an Addition to the Lustre there. 

Meantime America a Wonder saw ; 

A Youth in Age, forbid by Nature'' s Law. 

You that in t'other Hemisphere do dwell, 
Do of Old Age your dismal Stories tell. 
You tell of Snowy Heads and Rheumy Eyes 
And things that make a man himself despise. 
You say z. frozen Liquor chills the Veins, 
And scarce the Shadoiu of a man remains. 
Winter of Life, that Sapless Age you call, 
And of all Maladies the Hospital ; 
The Second Nonage of the Soul ; the Brain 
Cover'd with Cloud ; the Body all in pain, 
To weak Old Age, you say, there must belong. 
Trembling Palsey both of Limb and Tongue ; 
Dayes all Decrepit ; and a Bending Back, 
Propt by a Staff, in Hands that ever shake. 



Hppen&ix 83 



Nay, Syrs, our Cheever shall confute jou all. 

On whom there did none of these Mischefs fall, 

He Ltv'd and to vast Age no Illness knew ; 

Till Times Scythe waiting for him Rusty grew. 

He Liv'd and Wrought ; his Labours were immense ; 

But ne'er Declined to Praeter perfect Tense, 

A Blooming Touth in him at Ninety-Four 

We saw ; But Oh ! when such a sight before ! 

At Wondrous Age he did his Touth resume. 

As when the Eagle mews his Aged plume. 

With Faculties of Reason still so bright, 

And at Good Services so Exquisite ; 

Sure our sound Chiliast, we wondering thought, 

To the First Resurrectioji is not brought ! 

No, He for That was waiting at the Gate, 

In the Pure Things that fit a Candidate. 

He in Good Actions did his Life Employ, 

And to make others Good, he made his Joy, 

Thus well-appris'd now of the Life to Come, 

To Live here was to him a Martyrdom, 

Our brave Macrobius Long'd to see the Day 

Which others dread, of being CalVd aivay. 

So, Ripe with Age, he does invite the Hook, 

Which watchful does for its large Harvest look ; 

Death gently cut the Stalk, and kindly laid 

Him, where our God His Granary has made. 

Who at New-Haven first began to Teach, 
Dying Unship-iureck' d, does White-Haven reach. 
At that Fair-Haven they all Storms forget ; 
He there his Davenport with Love does meet. 
The Luminous Robe, the Loss whereof with Shame 
Our Parents wept, when Naked they became ; 
Those Lovely Spirits wear it, and therein 
Serve God with Priestly Glory, free from Sin. 

But in his Paradisian Rest above 

To Us does the Blest Shade retain his Love. 



84 Hppen&ix 

With Ripened Thoughts Above concern 'd for Us, 
We can't but hear him dart his Wishes, thus. 

* Tutors, Be Strict ; But jet be Gentle too, 
' Don't by fierce Cruelties fair Hofes undo, 

' Dream not, that they who are to Learning slow, 

* Will mend by Arguments in Ferio, 

' Who keeps the Golden Fleece, Oh, let him not 

* A Dragon be, tho' he Three Tongues have got. 

* Why can you not to Learning find the w^ay, 

* But thro' the Province of Severia? 

' 'Tw^as ModeratuSy who taught Origen ; 

* A Touth w^hich prov'd one of the Best of men. 

* The Lads with Honour first and Reason Rule; 

* Blotves are but for the Refractory Fool. 

' But, Oh ! First Teach them their Great God to fear ; 
' That you like me, with joy may meet them here.' 

H' has said ! — 
Adieu a little while. Dear Saint, Adieu ; 
Your Scholar Mvon't be long, Sir, after you. 
In the mean time, with Gratitude I must 
Engrave an Epitaph upon your Dust. 
*Tis true. Excessive Merits rarely safe ; 
Such an Excess forfeits an Epitaph ; 
But if Base men the Rules of Justice break. 
The Stories (at least upon the Tombs) will speak. 

Et Tumulum facite, et Tumulo superaddite carmen. 
(Virg. in Daphn.). 

EPITAPHIUM 

EzEKiEL Cheeverus ; 

Ludi-magister ; 
Primo Neo-portensis ; 

Dinde, Ipsuicensis 

Postea, Carolotenensis 

Postremo, Bostonensis ; 

cujus 



Hppenbir 85 



Doctrinam ac Virtutem 

Ndsti si Sis Nov-Anglus, 

Colis, si non Barbarus ; 

Grammaticus, 

a Quo, non pure tantum, sed et pie, 

Loqui 

Rhetor icus 

a Quo non tantum. Ornate dicere 

coram Hominibus, 

Sed et Orationes coram Deo fundere 

Efficacissimas ; 

Poeta, 

a Quo non tantum Carmina pangere, 

Sed et 

Caelestes Hymnos, Odasq : Angelicas, 

can ere, 

Didicerunt, 

Qui discere voluerunt : 

LfUcerna, 

ad Quam accensa sunt, 

Quis queat numerare, 

Quot Ecclesiarum Lumina? 

Et 

Qui secum Corpus TheologijE abstulit, 

Peritissimus Theologus^ 

Corpus hie suum sibi minus Charum 

deposuit. 

Vixit Annos, XCIV. 

Docuit, Annos LXX. 

Obiit, A. D. M. DCC.VIII; 

Et quod Mori potuit, 

Heic 

Expectat Exoptatq : 

Primam Sanctorum Resurrectionem 

ad Immortalitem. 

Exuvijs debetur Hones. 



Ilnbex S7 

A. 

Accidence, Cheever's . . . .12, 14, 15, 16, 26, 37, 67 

Adams, John 4? 

Adams, Samuel ........ 64, 71 

Agassiz 9 

Agawam . 17 

Ames, Almanack . • . . . . . . 21 

Ames, Dr. William ....... i9» 59 

Andover . 18, 20 

Andros, Sir Edmund ....... 28, 42 

Angier, Edmund 19 

Angier, Ruth ......... 19 

Anne, Queen 42 

Appleton, Samuel . . . . . . . . 17 

Artillery Election Sermon ....... 25 

Ascham 18 

Athenaeum, Boston . 16 

Autograph, Cheever . 16 

B. 

Bacon, Leonard Woolsej . 11 

Baldwin, Ernest H. ........ 14 

Barnard, Rev. John 36, 72, 77 

Barnett, John ......... 29 

Bay Psalm Book . 21 

Bellingham, Richard 24, 42 

Bentley, Wm., D.D 18 

Biglow, William 64 

Blue Coat Boys 27 

Boston 14, 19, 24, 42, 49 

Boston Latin School ... 24, 26, 38, 45, 46, 48, 51, 61 
Boston Latin School Association . . . .25, 53, 6i 

Bradford, William 20 

Bradstreet, Anne 20 

Bradstreet, Simon i7> 18, 26, 42 



88 IFn&ex 

Brooks, Phillips 36, 45, 52 

"Burial Hill," Char lestown 22,49 

C. 

Cambridge, Mass 19, 27, 60 

Cambridge University, England .... 10, 62 

Channing, W. E 71 

Charlestown, Mass. ... 20, 22, 23, 24, 25, 38, 49, 58 

Charles II 10, 24 

Chauncy, Charles 18 

Chebacco 23 

Cheever, Abigail 22 

Cheever, Ames . . . . • . • • 39, 7^ 

Cheever, Dr. David B. 78 

Cheever, Elizabeth . . . . . . . I3> 50 

Cheever, Ezekiel, of Salem 22 

Cheever, Ezekiel, Schoolmaster, 

9, 10, II, 19, 23, 25, 35, 38, 46, 53, 54 

Cheever, Ezekiel, of Charlestovrn 22 

Cheever, Hannah ........ 13 

Cheever, Mary 13 

Cheever, Nathaniel 22 

Cheever, Samuel . . 13, 18, 19, 20, 25, 36, 50, 57, 72 

Cheever, Sarah ......... 13 

Cheever, Susannah . . ... . . . 38, 49, 50 

Cheever, Thomas 22, 49, 50, 78 

Choate Island 78 

Choate, Sarah 78 

Choate, Thomas 78 

Christ's Hospital, London 27, 62 

Church Street, New Haven . . . . . . 10 

Clarke, James Freeman 68 

Corey, Deloraine P 78 

Corlet, Elijah 27 

Cotton, Rev. John 62 

Cromw^ell, Oliver 20 



Lof 



o 



89 



ln&ex 



D. 

** Day of Doom " 11,21 

Davenport, John ........ 9? 10 

Deer Island . . . . . . . . . 52, 62 

Diary, Sewall's 25, 38, 39 



64, 69 

37 

64, 69 

62 

24 

42 

17, 20 
13 



Dillaway, Charles Knapp .... 

Diary, Stiles' ...... 

Dixwell, Epes Sargent .... 

Dorchester, Mass 

Dryden 

Dudley, Joseph ...... 

Dudley, Thomas 

Dunster, President of Harvard College 

E. 

Eaton, Theophilus 9, 10 

Eldridge, Elisha D 78 

Election Sermon in Old South Church .... 77 

Eliot, John 20, 38, 58 

Elm Street, New Haven .... 
Emerson, Ralph Waldo .... 

Emmanuel College 

Endicott, John ...... 

Erasmus ....... 

*' Essay in Rhyme" 

Eustis Street Burying Ground, Roxbury . 



II 

71 
10 
20 

18 

43. 44. 49. 78 

45. 49 



17. 



Feoffers 


22 


Fox, George 


42 


Fiske, Arthur I 


. . . 64 


Fisk, Rev. John 


17 


Franeker University .... 


59 


Franklin, Benjamin .... 


42, 63, 64, 66, 71 


Free School 


17, 18, 43, 62, 65 


Funeral Sermon of Rev. John Barnard 


36, 72 



90 llnbex 

G. 

Gardner Francis 64, 69, 70 

Gay, A. M. 64, 70 

General Court 12, 13, 39, 60, 64, 65 

Gould, Benjamin Apthorp .... 64, 68, 70, 71 

Gould, Zaccheus . . 17 

•' Grammarian's Funeral " — Tompson . . . 46,47,48 
Granary Burying Ground ....... 49 

♦♦ Grandfather's Chair " 31 

Grant, Robert 52 

Greek 16, 26, 35 

Green, Dr. Samuel A. 46 

Green and Russell, Printers 16 

Grove Street, New Haven 10 

n. 

Hale, Edward Everett 24, 25, 51, 61 

Hall of Fame, New York 71 

Hancock, John 42, 64, 66, 71 

Harris, T. M 15 

Harvard, John 22,53 

Harvard University . . 13, 14, 18, 24, 26, 28, 39, 45, 69 

Hassam, John T 16, 18, 52, 78 

Haynes, Henry W 52 

Hawthorne, Nathaniel 31 

Holland University 19 

Hooker, Thomas 59» 60 

Hooper, William 64 

Hull, John 70 

Hunt, Samuel 64 

Hutchinson, Anne 12, 61 

Hutchinson, Governor 42 

I. 

Ipswich, Mass 17, 18, 20, 21, 22, 23, 38, 78 

Ipswich Historical Society 22, 23 



Tln&ex 91 



J. 

Jefferson, Thomas 42 

Jenks, Rev. Henry F. 24 

K. 

King's Chapel 25 

King Philip's War 42 

L. 

Lathrop, Ellen 22, 50 

Lathrop, Thomas 22 

Latin Epistles 18 

Latin Epitaph 85 

Latin Letters 57, 58, 59 

Leffingwell, E. H. . . • 19 

Leverett, F. P 64, 69 

Leverett, Governor .42 

Leverett, John 26, 42 

Lewis, Ezekiel 37, 40 

Lombard Street, New Haven 54 

Lovell, John 63, 67, 71 

M. 

Magnolia, Cotton Mather 9» I7j 21, 59, 60 

Manchester, Mass i7» 39 

Mansfield, Isaac, Rev. 58 

Marblehead 20, 36 

Massachusetts Colony 12, 20 

Massachusetts Historical Society . . 16, 18, 36, 39, 46, 58 

Massasoit 12 

Mather, Cotton ... .26, 35, 42, 48, 51, 53, 59, 78 

Mather, Increase 26, 41 

Mather, Samuel 35 

Maude, Daniel 62 

Maxwell, Samuel 37 

Memorial Hall, Cambridge 19 



92 1fn&er 

Merrill, Moses 64, 70 

Milton, John 11,24,63 

Monument in Ipswich ....... 23 

N. 

New Haven . . . . 9, 10, 11, 13, 14, 17, 18, 54 

^' New Meadows " 17 

Newman's Barn ......... 9 

Norcross, Grenville H 52, 53 

Norton, Pastor 21 

O. 

Oakes, Edward 41 

Old South Meeting-house .... 37, 39, 40, 42 

Otis, Harrison Gray ........ 64 

Oxford University lo, 62 

P. 

^'Paterna" 35 

Paradise Lost., Milton ....... 24 

Paine, Robert Treat 64 

Payne, Robert 18 

Pemberton (Rev.) 40 

Phillips Academy ........ 15 

Phillips, Wendell 68 

Philips, Mary 50 

Plymouth Colony 20, 24 

Pope, Alexander 24 

Pormort, Philemon 61, 62 

Prince, Thomas . 37 

Q. 

Queen Street, Boston 14 

Quincy, Edmund ........ 15 

Quincy, Josiah I4» ^5 

Quinnipiack 9 



flnbex 



93 



B. 



i6 
42 



Register, Historical and Genealogical .... 
Revere, Paul ......... 

Rogers, Nathaniel 

Rumnej Marsh 

Russell, Ezekiel 

Russell, Joseph 3^ 

Russell, Susannah 38, 40, 49, 50, 78 



21 

22 

50 



S. 



17, 18 



25 



Salem, Mass 

Saltonstall, Nathaniel 

Saltonstall, Richard . 

School, South Latin Grammar . 

School Street, Boston 

School-house, Ezekiel Cheever 

School-House Lane 

" Scripture Prophecies Explained " 

Sewall, Judge .... 

Smjbert 

Stiles, Ezra, President Yale College 
St. Paul's School, London 
Sumner, Charles 

T. 

Tablet of Ezekiel Cheever 

Temple Street 

"The Simple Cobbler of Agawam " . 

Thursday Lecture 

Tomb of Ezekiel Cheever, Esq., on Burial Hill, Charles 

town 

Tompson, Benjamin 45 

Topsfield 

W. 

Wadsworth, Mr. 

Walker, Samuel 



22, 


42 




18 




17 




25 


25. 


64 




54 




25 




15 


38 


41 




39 




37 




63 


68 


.71 




53 




II 




20 


25. 


34 


22, 


49 


49. 


62 




17 




38 




15 



94 



•fln&ex 



Walter, Nehemiah 
Ward, Nathaniel . 
Warren Avenue, Boston 
Washington, George . 
Waters, Rev. T. Frank 
Wenham, Mass. . 
Whitman, Ezekiel Cheever 
Wigglesworth, Michael 
Will, Ezekiel Cheever's 
Williams, Nathaniel 
Williams, Roger . 
Winthrop, John . 
Winthrop, John, Jr. 
Winthrop, Robert C. 
Winslow, Edward 
Witchcraft, Salem 
Woodbridge, John 
Woodmancy, John 
Woodmansey, Robert 



39» 40» 41 



26 
20 

53 

42 

23 

17 
78 

10 

49 

52, 63 
12 

17, 24 
18 
68 
20 

42 

62 

46 

46, 62 



Zealand 



31 



^THIS BOOK WAS PRINTED IN 
THE YEAR NINETEEN HUNDRED 
AND FOUR AT THE OFFICE OF 
FRANK WOOD, BOSTON ® ILLUS- 
TRATIONS BY AMERICAN EN- 
GRAVING COMPANY @ ® COVER 
DESIGN BY EMMA E. BROWN 






??•% 



.V-^j. 






50"% 






" ./^;V#;'" /w>" /w^> / 



"y '^^^ ■> 



' " T 









^<;' 



vo^ . V'^^^o^ %'^^77^\o3 ^^'-^TT^^d^ ^« 






fWi: ^<!>'% 



^^ "■^^. 



^'\. 



°o 



^*'^^:li:v°^ .^"^^^^.'i'v^ ^-*'*^*k'i'-^ 



/ 




\'' ^ / -^ 

^ , V * A "^ ^ , X -*^ .A ^ ^ , X -^ A ^ ' ^ . V -^ 



A %, ^ . V -^ A 










'"•">.-- 



"^ ^ , V -^ A . ^ ^ , X -^ <> 




